The mindset of today's media is to view each news event only in isolation. They're conditioned to believe that making any connection between two or more events will subject them to derision or scorn for being conspiratorial. It's unfortunate because the causal connection is often both logical and omnipresent. Fellow blogger Fred McCarthy
dares make such a logical connecting of the dots in discussing three separate stories in the latest edition of the IBJ. The first story discusses the plight of the Simons' losing NBA franchise, the Indiana Pacers, which recently received a $33.5 million subsidy courtesy of the taxpayers because of the owners' claim the franchise is bleeding cash. The second story discusses a $20 million shortfall the city of Indianapolis faces we're told is due to declining income tax revenues and property tax caps. Finally, the third story discusses the Broad Ripple Parking garage deal where the city has agreed to provide $6.35 million in funding to a private developer.
There is a connection between these news stories because together they represent nothing more than a continuation of long-standing public fiscal policy. It is a policy which makes taxpayer dollars available for back room deals with professional sports and with private developers for proposals approved for the right people by the right people in the current administration. And we use the term "current" because it has apparently carried through administrations of both political parties.
We continue to shovel public funds into the local branch of a dying enterprise. We continue to make deals smelling very much of crony corporate welfare. And we also continue reducing or eliminating ordinary municipal services to which taxpaying individuals are entitled.
Is this really how a "world class" city operates?
4 comments:
A lot of things that the Mayor has done bother me.However, the Broad Ripple deal may be the worst one yet. I can see the Pacers because there is a direct income to the city and to downtown establishments.
However,the Parking lot deal is pure evil. It is nothing but payback fot those who have given the Mayor a ton of Money.
One thing that people dont talk about is the fact that the owner of Keystone has GIVEN the MCRCC office space downtown.So the amount on the records is not real. The space is worth a ton of money,in excess of 60K a year in rent.But no one talks about that.
The same person owns the is building that won the Ripple contract..go figure
It is the place where the Mayor campains from.
I only wish that the normal Joe on the street would understand the Broad Ripple deal.Most voters only care about trash pick up and pot holes. the Mayor knows this. He will slide the Ripple deal under the rug, it will happen and there is nothing that we can do about it. The CCC will go along with him as they did with the ACS deal.
Im not a big Melina fan,but Ballards total disreguard for moral values is a joke. He lied to us when he was on his campaign.
He told us that Crime would be his top issue,.the Mayors top issue has to been to fill the pockets of those around him. Those who helped him get elected have been tossed in the trash.He now hangs with big money. he has shown a total distain to the Black community unless they are a gang member,then he jumps on his own like a rabid dog.
I was a fan of the Mayor because I believed what he had to say.Now,not so much. he lied to all of us.
Ballard is just lucky we don't have a federal prosecutor here like Patrick Fitzgerald in Chicago. If there was, numerous people in his administratiion would have been indicted by this point. They really have become quite brazen in their looting of public funds to reward political supporters. Nothing Rod Blagojevich was convicted of doing in Illinois comes close to the political corruption that has taken place on Ballard's watch.
Ben,
First, of all the penalty the Pacers would have paid to leave would have been too great. They weren't going anywhere.
Second, you're talking about moving discretionary spending around with the Pacers. Ask any economist if subsidizing professional sports makes any sense and the answer is no. Since they couldn't get an academic study to back them up they had to get a "homer" study done by a former Goldsmith staffer who consults with the convention/ hospitality industry which always wants more gov't subsidies.
LA has lost NFL teams over and again, and somehow the question of whether or not LA is a 'world class city' never comes up.
I long for a city to tell their pro franchise to go take a flying leap. That would do vastly more for the local economy than subsidizing it would.
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