A ton of money, but private money was spent keeping that horse alive, even in a sling, and ultimately the only choice was euthanasia.
What about that, for Town Center? Instead of more of the same old flavor, with Strib reporting May 5, 2008, "Bank wants out of Ramsey Town Center restrictions"?
The bank let Bruce Nedegaard and henchmen sell off half the land without paying down any part of the debt and now says the plan is unrealistic, flawed or stupid.
If they want stupid, give them a mirror.
So they can see an asleep-at-the-due-diligence-switch kind of being stupid.
Really stupid. Not watching the security. You always concentrate on the security.
Cut the losses, since any spending, we can anticipate would be a ton of taxpaper money, spent anew, because of sunk loss.
In business, no sane decision is based on sunk loss. Only potential for a yield matters. If there is no potential, and there really is none, then be sane, and go for the Barabo solution. Cut future losses. Tell the bank the plan is the plan, it binds them, as has been the City's litigation position, and then sit.
Let the bank do as it chooses. Just do not bleed the taxpayers anymore for the lost cause, and don't unrealistically say that any sunk loss can be recaptured easily.
With the market as it is now for shared-wall dense housing in the exurbs, get real.
_______UPDATE_______
An interesting comment was left claiming the loan was paid down but the principal balance remained the same because people were working the money not giving it to the bank. But beyond that, I had a chance to see a rebroadcast part of the most recent Ramsey City Council meeting - the tail end of discussion about authorizing city spending a good part of a million dollars for lighting and sidewalks along a virtually deserted street. City Administrator Ulrich indicated that the money is in a pot with some strings tied to it (and arguably to the interest it earns if the city sits on the cash as reserves) - but he quite practically noted, the only party having a right to contest how the earmarked pot of money gets spent is Ramsey Town Center LLC. Defunct, buried, bankrupt ventures usually don't sue over something that will put no money into the LLC or the onwership pockets. Not his exact words, but he more tersely noted that as a realistic thought. There's a lot of very costly Town Center storm water drainage money being spent. If the slush fund is not tapped for that costly work then taxpayers are.
Ben keeps smiling.
And one council member saying, in effect, it is something Ramsey can be proactive about, so let's do it. No rationale other than that. Light the vacant empty street and sidewalks once we put the sidewalks in before there is construction, if there ever is, to tear up the sidewalks and fend around the lightpoles.
Hooey. Not even a good appearance of thinking. Why waste?