Unknown
This is a great and civil discussion about important disagreements over how to view the city’ performance in managing a $175,000,000 spend of taxpayer dollars and how, or IF, we will ever recover it and what the collateral damage will be. I said “will” because it is a meter of when, not if. We already see short term collateral damage to small canal district businesses that are not in the TIF club of insiders. I’m. Wry concerned about the long term damage to the city from what increasingly appears to be inept handling of this situation. Just one example: a multi-million dollar mistake not knowing that expensive underground data and other infrastructure existed to support high tech businesses that were taken by eminent domain that a private developer would have known about just by seeing the signs on the doors of the businesses, let alone Dig Safe. I’m not as confident as Gary is that this will all,pencilout wohtout long term fiscal pain to taxpayers. I legit hope that Gary is right and I am wrong. It has been pointed out before that this critical discussion is happening only in a small, private ORH blog. That may be a larger issue as there will be more boondoggles unless that changes.
Gary Samela
Forgot to mention that the City is paying $575,000 per year of taxpayer money to keep the systems and utilities on at the old Worcester Auditorium so the building doesn't cave in. There were plans to redevelop it, but the closure of Becker College put the end to that.
Gary Samela
Consider the following: -The City was subsidizing the old Worcester City Hospital to the tune of $11 million per year. -The City was subsidizing Worcester Airport at $6 million per year -It took 25 years for the first biotech park to be built out. -It took 15 years for the Gateway Science Park to be built out. Developers usually don't pay millions for land, hundreds of thousands for design plans, and thousands on permits just to not develop a project. No one could have perceived the pandemic that caused material costs to skyrocket. I don't know what's the big deal that the City might have to subsidize the park for a couple of years until the project across the street gets built out. There’s probably $10-15 million of fat that can be cut out of the general budget. You could get rid of five of the 12 Assistant Superintendents at the school department to save $1 million per year. Some other services can be privatized at a cost savings. You don't mention the hundreds of jobs at the park that were created. This might be the first job for teenagers or elderly people looking to subsidize their social security benefits. Local businesses like Polar and Coney Island are making a killing selling their products at the park. You also to fail to mention that the City's garages and surface lots are realizing a bump in revenues as a result of game parking. You refuse to tell us what your alternate plan is. Do you think it was best for the City to have two large, blighted lots just sitting there for the next 25 years? It just seems like your very closed minded. When all these developments come to fruition, you’re going to feel very foolish.
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