urbanSTL

jlblues wrote:As far as diversity goes, I would say country music and country music fans are already very well-represented in our region.

jlblues wrote:. Should the developers be catering to the Cardinals fans that love the country-livin', or to the people that want to actually live downtown and in Ballpark Village.

jlblues wrote:where the advantaged people are all racist rednecks that love their Nascar and their country music.

Think twice: Don't be an idiot about a ballpark village

By Bill McClellan

ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH

09/15/2006



ITALICS MARKED IN ONE PLACE BELOW



When I think about the plans for Ballpark Village, I remember what a businessman told me when the Civic Progress guys bought the Blues and promised they would fix up the Kiel Opera House in return for some favors from the city.



"Does the city have this in writing?" the businessman asked. "Yes," I said. "It's all guaranteed."



"Then don't count on it," he said. "If you have to get it in writing, you're in trouble."



That makes sense. If a project looks good to a businessman, he'll want to do it. Think about Chouteau's Pond, the much-talked-about proposal to build a lake just south of downtown. If the city were to help with that project, it wouldn't need any written guarantees that businessmen would develop around the lake. Quite the contrary. Developers would be scrambling for lakefront property. Housing, restaurants, the whole deal. If you have a lake, the developers will come.



Not so with a ballpark. If developers thought a Ballpark Village were a great idea, they would have built a village around the old ballpark. They didn't. So when the Cardinal owners wanted some financial help for their new stadium, they promised - and put that promise in writing - that they'd also build a Ballpark Village. This would be a big plus for the revitalization of downtown.



Now comes the word that yes, the Cardinal owners could live up to that promise, but the Village would be a lowercase sort of place: ballpark village. Doomed to failure. Who wants to live in ballpark village? On the other hand, the city could have something spectacular - three times the size of the original plan - but the taxpayers are going to have to help out again. Maybe $100 million or so worth of help.



There are, of course, different ways to look at this. Jeff Rainford, the mayor's top aide, took an exuberant approach when he talked to a reporter: "We want the biggest, most exciting, most transformative project possible."



Then there is the less exuberant view. If this is really a worthwhile project, a winner, a money-maker, shouldn't the businessmen who are going to make the money come up with the funding? If they're not confident that the project is a winner, maybe the taxpayers ought to hold on to their wallets.



In the same story in which Rainford took the exuberant stance, there was this sentence: "Asked about criticism that might come from approving more public funding for the Cardinals, Rainford said, 'We've got a lot of small thinkers.'"



The day that story appeared, the mayor, as he so often does, retreated into his office and pounded away on his blog. He repeated the Rainford quote about small thinkers and then wrote: "One problem, though. Here's what Rainford actually told the reporter: 'We've got a lot of small thinkers at the Post-Dispatch.'"



Yes, we do. Big heads, but small thoughts. The big-head part is obvious. You need an oversized ego to go into this business, to want to see your name in print. And what about somebody who wants his BEGIN ITALICS!!!!!!!!0 picture END ITALICS!!!!!!!! in the paper? I'll admit it. Given a choice between a raise and a bigger photo, I always take the bigger photo. And yet, tiny thoughts. It must be hard to be the mayor of a city when you have a newsroom full of small thinkers down the street.



What I mean is, maybe the mayor and Rainford have a point. Maybe the Cardinal owners have all the faith in the world that Ballpark Village is a good idea. Corporate welfare is good. Entrepreneurial risk-taking is bad. The free enterprise system is for small thinkers.



So maybe we should be rooting for the biggest, most exciting, most transformative Ballpark Village imaginable. Maybe it will be the best thing that has happened to downtown St. Louis since the Kiel Opera House was restored. Wait a minute. It wasn't restored.

Mr. McClellan,



What frustrates me and many others in the St. Louis area, mayor's office included, is that you obviously are focused on writing your opinion without taking the time to gather the facts. Equally likely, you are altering and excluding facts to make your position stronger.



I can cite critical factual mistakes in your most recent column. For instance, you state "On the other hand, the city could have something spectacular - three times the size of the original plan - but the taxpayers are going to have to help out again. Maybe $100 million or so worth of help.". Three times the size? Have you actually paid attention to the financial requirements of what the Cardinals owners were to originally build and now the financial cost of the new proposal? Let me do the research for you - the Cardinals owners are required to build out Ballpark Village with a minimal investment of $60 million. Now, they have a much larger project plan and have increased the investment to $650 million. Do the math, 3 x $60 million does not equal $650 million. So your statement of three times the size of the original plan is off by a factor of $470 million, but I guess that's not important. Really, $470 million is just pocket change anyway.



You also state in the same sentence that the taxpayers will have to help again, maybe with an investment of $100 million. Do you really understand how the Cardinals will be getting this $100 million? Apparently not, and now your providing the public with false information again. First of all, the Cardinals have not yet disclosed an amount. The $100 million was an estimated amount based on projects with similar investment. The $X million dollars will come from the tax revenue generated from Ballpark Village, which oh by the way, generates a whopping $0 dollars right now. So really all the Cardinals are doing is what all kinds of other developers in the city have been doing, taking a portion of tax income from their rehabbed or new property, and using that as an investment towards the property itself. So yes, the city will now receive a smaller share of the tax revenues generated from the property, but most likely the smaller share of a $650 million dollar project will be larger than the total share of a smaller $60 million dollar project. Additionally, the development would most likely draw more people into the city, perhaps boost convention and tourist business, and provide a jumpstart for other downtown development. Boy, sure sounds like a bum deal to me, especially when you consider it might actually generate MORE taxpayer money!



What really frustrates me is how you continually quote Jeff Rainford, the mayor's top aide. This exact quote came from an AP article that the THE POST DISPATCH picked up detailing the project details. These are the same details I outlined above and you falsified. Please see my references below. This obviously tells me that you read the AP article, and still didn't detail the facts that were in that article.



Your job working for a major publication is to provide the public with the facts, and then provide your opinion based on these facts. Please stop providing the public with false facts, it is not good for the Post or the city.



Dave Metzger



References



The Cordish Company - http://www.cordish.com/redir.asp?loc=ht ... illage.asp

The Post Dispatch - http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/s ... enDocument

KMOV - http://www.kmov.com/topstories/stories/ ... f1d0d.html

Ihnen wrote:I do agree.



Bill's tongue must be so far in his cheek that only CS can see it! He may be tongue-in-cheek with his photo in the paper and sarcastic about supporting " the biggest, most exciting, most transformative Ballpark Village imaginable," but he still spouts incorrect information about public money and the project itself. How can inaccurately portraying something that one then criticizes be good journalism? I don't think that it's professional or responsible for a major newspaper columnist to be tongue-in-cheek with an $800M project in the middle of his own resurgent city. There's an admirable journalistic principle involved with gathering facts and suggesting an interpretation - I don't see the public good being served by tongue-in-cheek journalism. Is the public to decide which part is sincere? No, Bill's column is something you would find in an average college student paper.



It's difficult to find a point in his column anyway. Is it:

a) the Kiel wasn't renovated so BV won't be built?

b) government shouldn't be involved in shaping the city?

(an aside: does he think that ANYTHING in the StL area was built with government assistance? At the very least, funding Interstates and other road improvement HEAVILY subsidized places like the Galleria and all other shopping centers, industrial centers and suburbs)

c) he doesn't like the Mayor?

d) the Cards aren't good public citizens?

e) Chouteau's Lake makes perfect sense, but BV doesn't?

Accuracy is irrelevant.

Ihnen wrote:

Accuracy is irrelevant.

I don't mean to come off angry, but if accuracy in a major newspaper column is irrelevant then I suppose this is true for forum posts as well. And while this sheds some light on your previous contributions, it makes your posts irrelevant. The upside is that I don't need to take time and read them anymore.

The Central Scrutinizer wrote:
You are confusing a journalist with a columnist. He is the latter. Accuracy is irrelevant.

innov8ion wrote:Journalists are supposed to objectively report the news, otherwise known as actual reality. Columnists are tasked with taking actual reality and forming positions or arguments. To that end, accuracy is relavent and should be the foundation of a solid argument. Unless we're talking irresponsible rhetoric, which seems to be the case. metzgda was spot on, bravo.

The Central Scrutinizer wrote:
You are confusing a journalist with a columnist. He is the latter. Accuracy is irrelevant.

innov8ion wrote:Journalists are supposed to objectively report the news, otherwise known as actual reality. Columnists are tasked with taking actual reality and forming positions or arguments. To that end, accuracy is relavent and should be the foundation of a solid argument. Unless we're talking irresponsible rhetoric, which seems to be the case. metzgda was spot on, bravo.

The Central Scrutinizer wrote:
You are confusing a journalist with a columnist. He is the latter. Accuracy is irrelevant.

Your job working for a major publication is to provide the public with the facts, and then provide your opinion based on these facts. Please stop providing the public with false facts, it is not good for the Post or the city.

If developers thought a Ballpark Village were a great idea, they would have built a village around the old ballpark. They didn't.