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Just come to Lake Worth and you can have it all. That is the message that is out there and it is very loud and clear. We are very generous folks. We don’t ask too many questions if the proposal sounds good. We love to give away buildings. We love to give away assets. We negotiate nothing. We love to waste money. We have all sorts of dreams of green space. We love to re-design parking lots and literally take away potential income at our beach for a tree. We have little thought about taking away decal parking for mangroves. We continue to screw the resident taxpayer in every way possible in order to plant a seed that may never grow from this blighted hollow ground.
What about the CRA’s main mission of cleaning up slum and blight. Somehow over the last several years, that has fallen by the blighted wayside of our city streets and has now been replaced by the visions of total metamorphous.
We have a CRA that just can't figure out how to spend its money fast enough and the other night, simply takes it over the top. The entire room was stacked and packed (I have been told) with business folks and Chamber folks and all those who think that spending all of this money will improve their lives. Perhaps the CRA’s thoughts are, bring more businesses and these owners and visitors will just fall in love with our garbage ridden neighborhoods that have been taken over by criminals ... they will actually buy a house or start a business here.
Instead of starting at the foundation for building this “new house” of ours, the CRA is starting at the top…building the roof first over a bunch of hot air coming directly from the Field of Dreams mentality for which the CRA has paid Hands On Consulting $200,000. Tuesday they agreed to hand over another $700,000 to the Palm Beach Cultural Council, that incidentally, has twice the budget of the CRA. This decision is based on nothing quantitative that the PB County Cultural Council can really do for us only what they tell us they can do-- just hopes, dreams and wishes.
Their presentation was great but give them $700,000? On top of that, the CRA agrees to give away all this money to a group that hasn't even decided on a location. What sort of crazy is that? Just come here...we don't care where you land. That is the reality of what the CRA based its decision. The CRA is in a world of its own when it comes to spending huge sums of money. Immediately the Gateways come to mind.
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To me the sensible decision would be to buy the 14,381 SQ FT building at 1000 Lake Avenue for $900,000--that's two hundred thousand more to actually own something. Give a reduced rental rate to this Group to locate to this building. Give them some perks. After two years, if they have proven themselves to Lake Worth, extend their favorable lease. We then house our Code Department (if we have a code department still in effect) or use the extra space for other city departments. The CRA can then use this building as its headquarters and stop paying $2,500 a month rent where they are. In the meantime, we own a building on an important corner of an area that the City wants to develop in the future for a downtown government center. It is right across the street from City Hall. That building is on the market at half its value. The property is already very valuable but in five years it would be priceless and owned by us.
It really is time to stop this endless pipe dream of the CRA and all its give-aways and non-negotiated "deals." Prior to this it was the Gateways. It was a bunch of give-aways for those "scam" homeowners and others who took advantage. Now it is the artist’s destination. What next? For a city that is rapidly turning into garbage haven and one that can’t even afford its code officers anymore, you really have to wonder about the priorities.
13 comments:
The Cultural Foundation will probably be a good thing for LW but I can certainly see your point about this city rotting away. Clean up the blight first.
They have to start somewhere. You can't deny that Compass did a much better job of rehabbing the old senior center than the city ever could have. How can you be so sure the Cultural Foundation won't do the same to the BLIGHTED VACANT DELAPIDATED building right next to city hall? How can you be so sure that along with the green building and Compass the west side of the city won't start getting cleaned up. Think positive for once. It's all negativity and gloom and doom with you naysayers. Lynn you are on record as saying the city does not need a new city center. Now you are proposing they buy a building for almost 1 million dollars and spend another million to rehab it? Which one is it? You can't have it both ways. If the CRA did buy that building you'd be claiming it was corruption and a waste of money. No matter what they do they can't win with a bunch of negative people so why should they bother listening to any of you? You should be more upset with the commission you support than the CRA.
I am against WASTE. I don't feel that real estate is a waste. It most always goes up in value unless, of course, you are in Lake Worth right about now and having people neglect the slum and blight problem here. Giving away $700,000 versus buying our own property is just business smart. So be happy in paying $15 mil for two roads; be happy about paying $1 mil on the debt; be happy about the Pugh deal; be happy about pouring money into developments (more rentals). Is that what you call being positive?
What is positive is taking a business approach to everything that we do and being realistic about the money we have, where its spent and who gets it. Cleaning up this city is the priority.
Thanks Lynn for the blog article posting, what is bothersome is the CRA gives money away to things not dealing with blight like this and the Lucerne too. I am trying to get a few sidewalks done for the poor/immigrants/ and people like us in TRNA that walk in this neighborhood where there are no sidewalks on some parts between Lake and Lucerne on the ABCDEF Streets, our safety and living in all this blight are not concerns of the CRA obviously. I will share this with Joan from the CRA. Thanks for the article and keeping me up-to-date on what they are doing. Maybe some day they will do more for the poor and give more equality to the western downtown areas. Thanks for caring so much about our city and being so active. God bless.
My street used to be nice. Not anymore. It is full of renters and people not caring. It is full of criminals and gangs are close by. What is the city doing for me? It does seem that no one cares.
I like that idea about buying the building instead of just giving money away to someone and then having nothing. What's wrong with that poster at 10:46am?
How about the city not having: 1) the money to buy it, 2)the money to rehab it and 3) the money to maintain it.
If the city bought that building it would remain a vacant eyesore for many years. At least now there's a good chance it will be 1)fixed up, 2)have a professional tenant that maybe just maybe if you think positive will attract other businesses even if they are artistically based to the city.
Do you really think the city would have or could have done as good a job fixing up the old senior center as Compass did?
The city will receive priceless publicity in return for letting the Cultural Foundation operate out of the downtown. You guys just don't get it. You are so quick to condem everything and want to stop everything you don't think long term.
Who is more responsible for cleaing up the blight? It seems to me the city commission should be working with the city manager and the code department to work on that. If they are the ones negelecting that area and in fact making it worse by turning the shuffle board courts into a third world ghetto and then spending tax payer money to run it your beef should be with them not the CRA
Heloooooo--we are talking about the CRA. They had $700k to hand over. Talk about negative. With proper management, yes, we can maintain it. With the proper leadership, we can achieve anything.
"The people", your people have their elected officials in place. Where's the leadership? What has the city maintained well? Look at the beach, golf course, streets, city landscaping, police dept., city buildings etc. You'll be waiting a long time for the city to maintain anything properly. It's a better bet to give someone else a chance to improve it. That's not negative that's a fact. Negative is shooting down what could possibly be a great thing for the city before the deal is even finalized and without knowing the facts. That's being negative.
"Your" people--???
Look, let's get something straight- Do you think, for one minute, that those on this Commission are the ones who have run our city into the ground? I will turn the "your" back around on you then. Your people were in power. Your people are the ones that showed NO leadership. Your people are the ones who gave everything away with the excuse they could not maintain it. They had zero confidence in their ability to lead. There is not one person that can get our city in this blighted shape it is in in 2 lousy years.
As far as shooting down handing over $700,000 bribe to a cultural council that MIGHT do this city some good with grants or whatever, why not put our money into cleaning up this dreadful place? How is that for a start? Block by block--clean it up. That is the most POSITIVE thing we can do. Maybe then Top 6 will move on. Maybe then "your" people might become "my" people and we all can stop the bickering.
The presentation by the Palm Beach Cultural Council sounded great. I thought the whole thing sounded terrific and I said so in public comment.I was a little uneasy that Donna Ross's question about the price tag was not answered. Now we know what that price was. And to me, 700,000 is a shocking amount!Look,these people have a huge budget.Can't an organization EVER come into this city without their hands out ? We ,supposedly, can't afford books for our library or life guards, but we can spend 700,000 on a "MAYBE "? Sorry, but in these tight times, 700,000 was way too much for ANOTHER CRA giveaway,no MAYBE about it! Katie Mcgiveron
Tom McGow said to me last night that I had missed the mark on the PB Cultural Council. Perhaps so but I can guarantee you that the CRA missed its mark when it so willingly agreed to hand over $700,000 of taxpayer money with no guarantees and no negotiation. This is just plain wrong and I for one, will miss Wayne on this Board. He was always looking out for waste. He was always looking out for the taxpayer. Who will now?
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