The bank says it will do something this time around at the foreclosure, and that the city must back down. The City says, "Other way." Somebody backs down. Have a guess.
Sakry reports about 150 acres subject to $35 million blanket debt, plus city assessments. Ignore the assessments, that is $233,333.33 per acre.
Would you pay that for a weed patch acre? Would you buy the Brooklyn Bridge? Would you send good money in response to one of the Nigerian email letters?
TRY THIS: 322 acre total size, Trudgeon has said. Where were the bankers when the other 172 acres were being parceled out? At the North Branch tavern, lubricating up? Who did they leave watching the shop? The norm for a blankat debt with deed releases is if you release ten percent of the land from coverage of the encumbrance, then you prudently assure you get the debt paid down by at least a 10% share on the encumbrance balance, or you do not release.
Who are these clowns and where did they study Banking 101? They will get $35 million for that stuff when a very,very, very warm place freezes over. If then.
Does any of this pass the smell test to you? Nobody is going to give that much per acre for that stuff; with or without it being bound by the original Master Development Agreement, as yet a still open question. And when Sakry reports 150 acres, is that without the disputed land the City claims encumbred for parks and all included, or absent it as part of the reported acreage? Sakry was unclear about that disputed acreage - which is a substantial question when saying "It's about 150 acres at issue."
ADD IN THIS: How did they - our city's finest - pay for that next to useless [next to City Hall] ramp? What Faustian devil's-deal did they make?
The push to place the part of Ramsey north of Trott brook into urban developing city status, whatever that means, was that the quid pro quo with Met Council? Who wrote that deal, when, and how was it told to us the taxpayer-citizens?
1/4 acre crowed lots? All the way to the city limits? If that's a done deal WTF is the series of Comp Plan sessions about except deception and illusion?
So, what's the story? Done deal, in exchange for ramp money? Something else?
How was the bloody unneeded ramp financed?
Was the deal that Ramsey to the city limits would permit the crabgrass contingent to erect stuff where the new people will cost more in services than they generate in new taxes? What? Who cut the ramp deal(s) with the City, what was the quid-pro-quo? And again, who holds title to that thing? The city's EDA, as with City Hall? Some other smoke and mirrors shell game, similar but different?
Be thankful that at least for now the words "Port Authority" are no longer in the lexicon - not that the perpatrators of that scam ever really went totally public with it.
There were Jungbauer and Abeler sponsorship measures in the legislature - some even getting to a vote - where the council had never voted - and only Bonnie Balach, allegedly, was talking to legislators, purportedly "for the city." Who gave her what marching orders, anyway?
Who's Bonnie Balach and how was she tasked to do something the Council never approved? Good question? Go to City Hall sometime, and let me know the answer you get from asking it.
There's more to Sakry's article than in the following excerpting, so buy the paper or check that above link (buy the paper, actually, because your purchase helps keeps your local paper operating).
Now, see if there is any appearance to you of revisionism in this:
Keeping the vision
“Town center is more than bricks and mortar. It’s about the vision and it’s important to maintain the vision,” said Trudgeon.
According to Trudgeon, it will not be the same specific product that was designed by the community four or five years ago.
The vision “can take shape in a lot of different ways,” he said.
“We are interested in seeing the project is a success and built out,” said Trudgeon.
Although it’s hard for Trudgeon to speculate on what would change, if anything, “the council has affirmed a couple of times the project’s vision is important to them and they want to maintain that vision,” he said.
Whatever potential changes may be presented, it needs to be pedestrian friendly, said Nelson.
Huh? What about perhaps making it "taxpayer friendly" Heidi? Ever think about that one? WTF is "pedestrian friendly" other than many things to different people so that the statement is wholly empty. Revisionism afoot, is all I can read in it.
And, Patrick, get real. "... designed by the community four or five years ago," Patrick, that does not float. The community is not going to walk the plank on that one. It was designed by the pack of architectural individuals bleeding fees out of Nedegaard, with complicit aid from city hall. The community in no way is to blame and the community should be greatly insulted by any such comment from one who has a big share of the blame for it, not as instigator, but as facilitator. Get real man, we have no time or tolerance for that kind of dissembling. You are bright Patrick, but so are we. We are in mop-up mode, we are trusting the planning people to make the best of things, but there is absolutely no help to casting vague blame on "the community" when we can name responsible individuals, which in past postings I have done. Do the mop-up with us, staff people, we like you and believe you are not the ones at fault, but certainly don't blame us for it. We are not at fault one iota and get and keep that straight because you need to maintain your credibility with us. Sakry continues:
Deal said the city needs to rethink the RTC project and renegotiate the master development agreement.
That "Deal" reference kicks back to an earlier part of the article:
“It simply priced the land out of the market. That really took the project out,” said Jim Deal, who owns 26 acres of property in RTC.
As for the future, “not a lot can be accomplished until the lawsuit between the city and the bank is settled,” he said.
Although he has made the bank numerous offers for the property, Deal said his offers were rejected because they did not cover the $35 million mortgage and the liens on the property.
While he still believes in RTC, “it’s a tough sell out here right now,” he said.
Deal said the project could get done in 20 years, 10 years if it went really well.
First, "It simply priced the land out of the market," is a crock. The bank will have to take a king-sized hosing for its improvident managing of its loan affairs, as is fully proper, and the land will have to be priced by the market, as it exists now, being encumbered [or not] by city rights. Priced with a discount for that uncertainty. And even $200,000 an unencumbered acre, who's around to pay that? Deal?
Any other version of what's just is false. Second, Deal's talking a bit different time frame than the mayor and the chairman of the Town Center Task Force were telling us earlier; or the former city administrator quoted years earlier in Sakry reporting about our doing Christmas shopping there, 2004.
Big time fiction, guys. And why should we forget or politely decline to remind you? You need and deserve it.
Time probably will prove Deal the better prognosticator.
But he has an incentive to cast dark musings, just as the others had Pollyanna causes. "Alliance for Ramsey's Future," and other fronts run from who knows what locales, were marketing arms of land interests, or included that influence to a big degree.
And all the while, go ask Diana Lund, what is the tax burden on the citizens from the council's inopportune "guesses" of success? What is being paid on city debt, while the city, bank, and Deal three-cornered p---ing contest proceeds?
A lot more than reasonable, whatever the amount. A confederation of dunces did this thing to us, acting in concert and thinking themselves smart. The community did not disadvantage itself. Not at all, except by too much and too widespread an indifference and inattention to what was going on. Passive fault, while others were the actors.
SO: Is Deal part of the confederacy? A fox wanting a shot at running the henhouse? A white knight to the rescue? All of these or none of these? Sakry further writes:
In 20 years it will be done, but it will not look like the original vision, according to Deal.
Bringing urban to Ramsey, a bedroom community, doesn’t fit, Deal said.
Deal said it should continue to match the bedroom community to the amenities that go around that, such as malls, restaurants, big or mid-sized box stores.
The city also needs to offer some incentives for businesses to come, he said.
There it is. Fox wanting full run of the henhouse.
The guy wants it to come with a subsidy. He lost my interest in helping him one bit.
Forget 20 years. Go a hundred with it exactly as it is, as a monument to colossal stupidity so it is less likely it is repeated. But Jim Deal has a lot of money. So don't TIF it to make Jim Deal wealthier than he already is. Be sensible for a change, instead.
There seems no other way to characterize all of this than what, a few years ago, the lady at the key cutting kiosk on Main Street in Anoka across from the school said to me about it. "We got screwed." Let's call it enough of a screwing for now, and not give Jim Deal his turn.
The man has my 100% backing if he wants to do something with the sow's ear, without asking for a public subsidy. When he wants TIF he loses my support, and I oppose his effort. That simple. That clear. Think.
IN FAIRNESS: So far, Deal has been generally honest. Revisionism is afoot. But compromise is not inherently wrong or evil. Sometimes it is needed to mop-up the excesses others have caused. Have no doubt. Hanging together is better than hanging separately, as Franklin said. Where it goes if James Deal is driving the machine, Deal is still being vague on that, but he deserves some slack because he still is negotiating a risk. He still appears the most sensible and least deceptive of actors seen so far in the play. This is very, very, very, very early in the negotiation posturing. The deal is not dead because Deal will not give the bank $35 million. Nobody would be that stupid and the bank knows it. Deal did not get wealthy being hasty or a fool. Things now will be played out, with Deal cautiously fostering a mood that favors his maximizing his gain - if we'd only give him free money so the deal is not broke and staying broke. That's posturing. Fine Jim. Now leave us alone and cut a deal with the bank based on the lawsuit being there and the bank having to discount to you for it and you having to price that additional risk as part of things.
These are adults, gambling. Little else. Why subsidize that with taxpayer money? Answer - there's no good reason, but that alone does not mean it won't happen. Expect it. More likely than not. People spending other peoples' money sometimes are less provident than with their own.