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Jul
21
Another nasty TIF abuse
July 21, 2006 | 13 Comments
The City Council just approved TIF subsidies for a development that is in no way blighted. Hunt Midwest is going to build yet another strip mall, this one at the corner of North Oak and Vivion. The land is currently a beautiful piece of open space on the campus of the Midwest Baptist Seminary, adjacent to the Northland Fountain.
No sane person can credibly argue that this greenfield site in the middle of our metro’s hotest suburban market needs any public subsidy. Even crazier is that experts already believe that this strip mall will endanger the success of the heavily subsidied Antioch Mall redevelopment just down the road. Applause to Councilwoman Becky Nace, the only councilmember with the balls to question this blatant transfer of tax money to a private company.
Star: Seminary land gets TIF approval
Categories: Business, City Council, Real Estate
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Becky Nace doesn’t deserve anything. All she proved is that she is ineffective as a legislator. She couldn’t sway one fellow councilperson to see things her way. That’s not leadership. It’s grandstanding. I’ll applaud her when she sways 6 other votes. Being the lone dissenter does nothing but grab some ink in the paper which is all she really wants anyway.
You are right about one thing. This TIF plan is ridiculous.
Well, at least she made her point. Which is the correct point. I grew up on the other side of the seminary across the street from the adjacent woods. It’s one of the only places left where dear and turkey still roam around that close to the center of the city. Is that a blight qualification? The problem with TIF as I understand it and what I’ve noticed is that it creates competition among municipalities to give out tax breaks. They think if we don’t give them the abatement someone else down the road in another city will and we’ll miss out.
Now would be a good time to contact our councilmembers and let them know if you are disgusted by this decision.
They know we’re disgusted Heidi, they just don’t care. They take the attitude that we the proletariat can’t comprehend economic development strategies and therefore they must make these deals “for the good of the city.”
Kenny is right though. It’s going to take more than an 11-1 grandstand play.
You have to love the rationale about not waiting until the area became blighted. How does a meadow become blighted? Too many dandelions?
This absolutely disgusts me. TIF abuses in KC have been going on far too long without anyone stepping up and and putting a stop to it (or at least attempting to). This proves the apathy of the KC voters. Hopefully with the increase of active young professionals in the urban core, there will be a movement towards ACCOUNTABILITY.
SK. Hopefully there will also be an increase in active YOUNG professionals on the council. Have you looked at the demographic on this bunch? Is there one councilman under the age of 50? Sweep ‘em all out I say.
You just wait, Kenny. I’ve been living on the west coast for over 5 year now and have plans to come back “home” to KC. I have learned that it takes viewing a city from both the inside and the outside to see the good, the bad, and the potential. I look forward to coming back and becoming active in the movement for a BETTER KC.
wooooo, go get them SK, we can’t wait for you to come back to KC and ave us!
Poor ukee. It’s that “us and them” attitude that keeps KC from reaching its potential. If people band together to make something better- “I” never said I was going to “save” anything- we can make things happen. Until people (ukee, city council, etc) open up and become INclusive rather than EXclusive, the dreamers of KC will just keep on dreaming.
BTW- Kenny, hopefully YOU got the jest in the “just wait” statement. Absolutely no boasting was intended…
I got it. I am curious as to when you’re coming back though. You sound like the kind of activist this city needs. We have a golden opportunity for some young progressive leaders to emerge this next council election. There will be a major turnover in the council.
I hope this election won’t be the same old tired bunch of geezers who think they know best.
Yeah, right. Don’t forget that most of the new “active young professionals” in the urban core are living in TIF subsidized and otherwise tax-abated condominiums.
Progessive young pros in most cases refer to themselves as the “Creative Class”. A. Birch
pointed it out. This is a fad throughout teh country. Subsidized condos, lofts, lattes and fun places for them to play. The developers love it they make out, the CC loves it they have a planned subsidized life style. The politicos love it they see it as sexy. Who pays? Everybody else! You do not want these people on your council. Maybe younger but more conservative. Anyway, when these younger people meet someone, get married and start having kids, they will be heading to the suburbs. Then the loft/condo developments loose value and guess whos makes up theTIF or abatement shortfall. Just more of theat Richard Florida crap. At least they fianlly ran him out of Pittsburgh. We were able to resist a lot of this in NW PA but some younger folks got elected and some are trying to push this. This in a community that 52% of the households are low/mod income. They claim the tax breaks and subsidies will provide incentives to grow out of local budget problems. “VoDoo Economics”.
[...] But then KMBC decided this was one of its top stories last night, despite all of the other things going on around the area. How about doing some journalism? I’ll even give you a story: how come whenever we get a heavy rain, the sewers turn Brush Creek into a cesspool, but still haven’t been fixed? Maybe bring up the fact that while million dollar condos are nice and all (as is TIF money for ridiculous developments), some infrastructure would be nice — after all, rich people gotta poo too. [...]