Canyon Cliffs Discussion Deferred 90 Days
That was the quickest meeting I’ve ever been to. The County Plan Commission’s only business in this special meeting was to vote on an application from Oakmont Development to defer another vote on the original project for 90 days. Discussion on the lifting the sewer restrictive covenant was deferred for 90 days as well.
I suppose that gives the developers time to let their frivolous lawsuits kick in and potentially scare the three opponents of the project.
FWR Covers “The Kelty Faithful”
Michael Summers at the Fort Wayne Reader hit another homerun with his recent article on Matt Kelty’s supporters. Summers goes after the personal angle and gets some of the Kelty insiders to speak openly about their disdain for Kelty’s plight and why they feel he’s being railroaded.
I’m not going to provide editorial comment - I’ll leave that to others. But no matter what side of the Kelty debate you come down on you’ll enjoy the article. The Fort Wayne Reader is providing the best feature material in town right now. Congrats to Mr Summers for his hard work and dedication…
H/T: Scott Spaulding
Will The Strong Arm Tactics Pay Off?
The county plan commission will have a special meeting at noon on Thursday to “reconsider” the Canyon Cliffs development. They will also “reconsider” lifting the sewer restrictions that would allow the city to expand its sewer service to the Canyon Cliffs development.
Of course this occurs only days after Bodenhafer and the rest of his band of thugs filed a personal (and frivolous) lawsuit against the three commission members who originally voted against the project. The question is whether or not the developers’ strong-arm tactics will pay off?
Since the development needs 5 votes to proceed I would strongly suggest that the 3 members that voted against the project not even bother to show up to Thursday’s meeting - a protest if you will. Maybe if they don’t show then they won’t get sued…
Will Bodenhafer Just Resign Already
I find it incredibly audacious that, as the president of the plan commission, Charles Bodenhafer did not resign his position before bringing the contentious Canyon Cliffs development before the board. After all, he helped draft the ordinance that he then later tried to exploit to fast track the development.
One has to wonder why an unpaid volunteer wouldn’t just step down in order to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest. But now he’s just gone too far - suing his fellow commission members? He can’t be serious. There is no way in hell any company would allow the president of its board of directors to sue fellow members and remain on the board.
Bodenhafer should resign from the plan commission immediately - it’s the ethical and professional thing to do. Of course the developer community doesn’t want that to happen as he’s far more valuable to them on the board than off…
FWCS Moves To Specialized High Schools
A couple of days ago the JG had a story about the decision by FWCS to move to specialized high schools. Scott Bryson, author of the American Societal Review blog, has an awesome post about this decision and sums up my feelings quite nicely - you should definitely read the whole thing:
First of all, to help student prepare for a global economy should be the province of colleges and trade schools, not high school. High schools should prepare students to enter and succeed in college.
[...]
FWCS seems to think their students will not succeed in a global economy because they don’t understand engineering. This doesn’t even account for the struggles students have with basic english.
[...]
Finally, what are “21st century skills?” Is proper english grammar no longer considered a required skill? It seems math is quickly becoming obsolete since cash-registers tell the employee how many of each coin is required to make change. But when the point of an education is only to get a job, why worry about details like math and reading comprehension.
The last thing FWCS needs is specialty high schools. The kids in this district are struggling with the basics - why not put more resources into helping them with that rather than pushing an engineering and technology curriculum? If you can’t multiply numbers without using a calculator then you have little chance of making it through college.
One of the new specialties is a technology program modeled after the New Tech school in Napa, California. Again, this is a bad idea and I’ll let Bryson explain why:
More taxpayer dollars to be wasted on consultants
Thursdays headline of the Journal Gazette made my blood pressure rise by 10 - 15 points. “Space sharing back on table.”
Two years ago the City of Fort Wayne and Allen County were on the verge of combining and “co-locating” in a building to save costs.
According to the JG article:
“The City scrapped plans to move offices to Renaissance Square in 2006 because renovations were $1,000,000 more than expected. The cost estimates came from a $20,000 study from Design Collaborative.”
Also per the JG article:
The City and County have hired Design Collaborative in 2008 for $45,000 taxpayer dollars to study the costs for “rearranging numerous governmental departments.”
It seems every couple of years we hire a consulting firm to do this study.
How many times do we have to hire Consultants to perform the same study?
Mike Sylvester
Developers run amok in Fort Wayne
I have always been irritated by the fact that local “Developers” have been able to get pretty much any “Development” they wanted approved fairly easily by local Government.
“Developers” only lose when a huge number of citizens get upset and that very rarely happens.
Today’s headline in the News-Sentinel makes my blood boil. “Developer suing 3 for Canyon Cliffs votes.”
Give me a break.
“Developers” have long had their way in Fort Wayne and Allen County and pretty much every body of Government has bent over backwards to accommodate every “Developer” in the name of construction and progress.
This has resulted in Fort Wayne being a sprawling City with expensive City services due to the sprawl.
If we are going to continue to poor money into Downtown Fort Wayne then we absolutely must limit “Development” on the edges of Fort Wayne.
I am absolutely appalled that “Developers” are going to sue three planning commission members and the Planning Commission itself over their votes concerning Canyon Cliffs.
Give me a break…
I wish that the ENTIRE Canyon Cliff’s Project had been killed and I feel that the ”Minor Plat Ordinance” needs some serious revision because if it is interpreted the way the “Developers” and their lawyers interpret it we might as well do completely away with the Planning Commission.
Mike Sylvester
P.S. This is an issue that YLNI and the supporters of Harrison Square should get involved in. Harrison Square and similar projects are doomed to fail if the City of Fort Wayne continues to grow in an uncontrolled and haphazard fashion.
What A Bunch Of Assholes
I don’t use profanity much here at FWP so I apologize if this offends anybody but some things are so outrageous they invoke a visceral response.
If you didn’t read Kevin Leininger’s column in today’s NS then you should. As expected, Oakmont Development has decided to sue the plan commission for rejecting their Canyon Cliffs project. What is completely outrageous is that they have decided to sue them as individuals and not members of a government body:
Significantly, the three commission members are being sued as individuals, not as public officials protected from liability, “because governmental entities and employees are not immune from negligence in the performance of ministerial duties.”
[...]
“I didn’t realize you could sue (commission members) individually. This puts a different twist on what you volunteer for. Why would anyone ever serve?” she (Susan Hoot) said.
Of course that is exactly the point - these guys want to intimidate people into doing their bidding. They are trying to send a message that any government official or volunteer board member that dares to cross them will put their own financial well-being in jeopardy. The vast majority of the community is against them, the plan commission is against them, so their only recourse is to bring baseless personal lawsuits.
I’m sure I’ll get a litany angry e-mails but it doesn’t matter as nothing is going to change how I feel about this - these guys are a bunch of assholes…
Good news for Harrison Square supporters and taxpayers
The Fort Wayne Wizards extended their current contract to play in Fort Wayne through 2010.
This contract extension is a very good thing for Harrison Square and for the taxpayers of Fort Wayne.
There is obviously no way that the new baseball stadium could possibly spur downtown development without a resident baseball team and it seems unlikely that Fort Wayne could have quickly located a single A or double A team and “convinced” them to move to Fort Wayne. “Convincing” another team to move to Fort Wayne likely would have cost the taxpayers of Fort Wayne a significant amount of taxpayer dollars.
The two year contract extension is clearly good news!
Mike Sylvester
John B. Kalb testifies at County Council
I want those that had to be at work when Tuesday’s County Council heard public testimony before they voted on the proposal to approve the issue of a $25 million bond to aid in financing the Maplecrest Road Extension Project. So here it is:
Good Morning, Councilors. My name is John B. Kalb, I am a citizen, a property owner and property taxpayer in Allen County, Indiana. I have with me this morning my “spring” installment payment which I will be depositing in the county treasurer’s office later today.
I am here to express my opinion which is opposition to issuance of a $25 million bond for the “Maplecreast Road Extension Project”. I believe this project is no longer needed and should not be funded with a long-term “pay-later” financing scheme because:
A) I attended the hearing last month ehere 4 members of your august body questioned the necessity of this overpriced project - but then in a subsequent meeting, all except one voted to go ahead with the project in what was a complete turn-around surprize. I have questioned some of you as to why the change in reasoning and was told that “the project was already started (engineering had been done and had been paid for from the $11 million of federal funds)and Allen County would have to somehow repay $3 to $4 million if we didn’t go ahead. So this is the new way things are going to get done in our county (and City of Fort Wayne) - our governmental departments go out on a limb, spend $’s for land, buildings,et al to be used on an unapproved project AND THEN WHEN IT GETS TO THE BODY THAT NEEDS TO APPROVE IT, it’s a “fait acompli” - the elected entity is left with no choice but to approve the project - can you read my lips? HARRISON SQUARE BALLPARK!
B) Councilors - you are not working for Do-It-Best, Walmart or bridge and road contractors - you have sought and were elected to your position to represent the people who have chosen to live in Allen County - ALL OF US! Not just a few. Why can’t you listen to your constituents?
C) In Indiana, due to a revision in our State Code via Public Law 146 which was passed by our General Assembly and signed into law by our governor this spring, registered voters who are property taxpayers now have a method to express their opinions on bond issues like this one (exceeding $12 million) by way of a ballot question in the next general election….This is accomplished, per this public law, IC 6-1.1-20-3.5, by getting 100 or more signatures on a petition to the county election board in this case asking, ” Shall Allen County issue bonds to finance the Maplecrest Road Extension Project” to be placed on the ballot at the next general or primary election. Then the voters would have to, by a majority vote at this election, approve your council’s proposed debt service for this project or it could not occur using this bonding method.
If you vote today, or anytime at a future meeting to issue said bonds for this project, our group has the necessary signatories to file said petition. Contrary to what Mr. Fishering testifided, we are of the opinion that this bond DOES fall under this public law. Members of our state house of representatives Ways and Means Committee have indicated concurance with our interpretation.
D) It is time to stop these “local ear-marks” - this is no different than what we are so critical of our national congresspersons in using ear-marks to use public funds for very questionable projects. This project is one of those - it may have made sense prior to the builing of I-469, but is nonsense now.
E) It is also time to stop the “corporate welfare programs like this project, (and like the Harrison Square ballpark) that net unfair benefits to corporate entities like Do-It-Best, Walmart, building contrators, bond attorneys, (Hardball Capital), et al. I have a brother-in-law who manages and is one of the owners of a local building contracting firm. When I discussed my concerns about this type of project, he said, “John, you know that you are working to take the bread off our home table, don’t you?” I answered him, “Yes, I am, but these actions will allow many, not a few, to keep bread on their tables in Allen County”.
F) One of our Allen County Commissioners stated recently, “I think that one of my main jobs in my position is to seek the maximum dollar return of our federal tax monies, that Allen County sends to Washington DC, to fund projects in Allen County” This from an individual who tells us that he is “a fiscal conservitive”! This attitude is what has led to “Bridges to Nowhere”, $750 toilet seats, et al.
G) Later today, during part of your budget meetings, the Fort Wayne-Allen County Airport authority will be asking for you to add $2.8 million to their property tax levy for the next tax cycle. This is necessary and due to a guaranty by Allen County that , if for any reason, the Airport Authority was unable to pay the deby service on bonds used to build hangers and aprons for Kitty Hawk Air Freight, the payments would be made out of general property tax revenues. Since this company went”belly-up”, we are stuck. How many times does this have to happen before we understand that “Government cannot operate as a profit-seeking business?”
I ask you to vote NO on this request. Thank You
