I attended last night's community event at Ogden's Union Station, and would like to offer my obervations of what occurred.The event was broken into three segments: 1) a half-hour introduction and anti-Rec Center "pep-rally;" 2) a general presentation on "modern" urban planning by the featured speaker Mr. Howard Blackson III; and, 3) audience participation.
The first segment basically boiled down to a spirit-rally for the anti-Rec Center event sponsors. Mitch Moyes and Sharon Beech played a shrill tag-team for the first thirty-five minutes, blaming the Ogden City administration for their two most recent failures, the petition drive and the federal court case. It was the same old stuff rehashed; and I won't go into it "at length," except to say that it went on for far "too long." One significant highlight of this initial segment, however, was a short series of remarks by one Aaron Mueller, a local real estate developer, who somehow wound up with the microphone in his hand. Before the mike could be ultimately wrested away, amidst much spirited booing and cat-calling from the partisan crowd, he managed not only to upbraid Mr. Moyes and Ms. Beech for their late arrival to the planning process, but also to read from a recent Standard-Examiner article a short quote from Judge Stewart, explaining his actual rationale for dismissing the plaintiffs' lawsuit: "Plaintiffs' allegations against defendants themselves simply do not establish federal jurisdiction, but, rather, appear to be a thinly veiled attempt to make a last minute end-run around state statute to accomplish judicially what they could not accomplish through appropriate procedural means." To say that Mr. Mueller's comments took the wind out of the event promoters' sails would be something of an understatement. It also set the tone for the final segment of the evening.
The second segment was the feature presentation itself. Mr. Blackson is a young, energetic and knowledgeable speaker. He delivered a detailed "power-point" primer on the key elements of successful urban planning: preservation of significant historical structures, concentric development (high density uses forcused in the center and progressively lower density radiating to the periphery,) the creation if liveable neighborhoods, the creation of a local employment-base, etc., etc., etc. Unfortunately, his presentation did not live up to its billing. Not only did Mr. Blackson fail to explain why the present Ogden city development plan "would not succeed;" he actually affirmed most of the current plan's basic elements. If anything, it demonstrated that Mayor Godfrey's administration is probably on the right track. For example, Mr. Blackstone emphasized the need for Transit Oriented Development -- the creation of healthy residential development within walking distance of commuter rail. Commuter rail will be coming to Ogden as early as 2008; and Ogden city's current downtown plan is obviously well ahead of the curve on that. This segment was also a little too long for the audience in attendance, and possibly too detailed, as well. By the time Mr. Blackson had completed his 1-1/4 hour-long 154-slide presentation, he'd lost about half of his original audience. Most of the folks who'd been cheering and "high-fiving" during the introductory segment had either fallen asleep in their seats, or had departed the building entirely by then.
Things picked up considerably in the final "audience participation" segment though. First to the microphone was Descente N.A.'s corporate Vice president, Curt Geiger. Mr. Geiger spoke for about ten minutes, and offered an articulate and passionate explanation of why his company had chosen Ogden, Utah as its new North American headquarters, when other more seemingly prestigious cities might have been selected instead. "'Americana' and proximitely to the ski slopes" was his story in a nutshell. He also gave Mayor Godfrey profuse credit for his company's arrival in town. "More ski industry companies will follow," he predicted.
The comments session moved forward from there, with other pro-development citizens speaking in their turn, both at the microphone, and from the body of the audience. Notable among those was Gary Nielsen, of Gold's Gym. He grabbed the mike and also spoke articulately and passionately. He complained that nobody from the CCFOF group had ever contacted him or his venture co-partners (Fat Cats) about their financial capacity to proceed with the Rec Center project, or about the project's financial viability, either. He pointed out that the terms of the Ogden lease were similar to, and typical of, other leases he has for other facilities, and criticized the people who are getting in the way of the deal he's made with Ogden City
As the meeting drew to a close, Mr. Moyes was walking around in circles, throwing up his arms, and muttering to himself. Ms. Beech was seated a row or two back, screeching at Mr. Nielsen to give up the microphone, to a background tumult of half-hearted boos and catcalls. The event promoters never got the microphone back until the lights were turned off unceremoniously by building management around 9:30 p.m. As the audience filed out of the room in the dark, the hapless Mr. Moyes and Ms. Beech never got the chance to make their final sales pitch.
I'd score it Pro-development - 4, Antis - 0. You can chalk this up as another failure for our local knights-errant, I think. Democracy broke out passionately in Ogden last night -- even within a partisan echo chamber -- and the anti-Rec Center "forces" couldn't be very happy about that, I think.
7 comments:
Here are some observations of my own from last night:
There was a point where a certain pro-person tied Mr. Moyes up on the question of whether or not the money for the rec. center is really lost if it is not used. It seemed like Mr. Moyes basically said that it would be lost if it was not used on some sort of project by the end of the year. Then in the next breath he would say that it really would not be lost.
I also had some question as to what he wanted done with the allocated rec. center money. He has an idea to remodel the laundry building to the south of the Union Station and turn it into a museum with a Smithsonian affiliation. I believe this to be a good idea. However, he seemed to want the project started by the end of the year so the money wouldn't be lost (which led to more confusion because he kept saying that it wouldn't be lost). Having some experience in construction (my major at W.S.U. is Construction Management), it seems like it would be pretty hard to get a museum project started by December 31 of this year. Even if it is fast tracked it still seems like it would be difficult to start a project in the $7 million range by the end of the year. There are a lot of planning processes, tests, evaluations, and government approval's that have to be done BEFORE a project ever breaks ground. An example would be the would be rec. center has taken years from planning to being on the verge of construction.
Another thing I found interesting was more of Mr. Mueller's comments before he addressed everyone at the front of the meeting. Mr. Moyes said that what needed to be done with downtown was to market the old buildings as well as the city (he suggested that they put an add in the Wall Street Journal) and then sell the land downtown including the mall site to individual investors that would certainly buy if given the opportunity. Mr. Mueller's comments to that were to the effect that there had to be a reason for somebody to want to buy, not just because it is cheap. Then somebody else brought up the point that the buildings have been for sale for years and years, including the mall property, and nobody has wanted to buy it. This person also made the point that the only reason anybody wanted to buy now was because of the of the rec. center.
I agree with rudi that Mr. Blackson's presentation basically said that the city was on the right track. His words were something like, "Commuter Rail will be the biggest thing to hit your city." His only discrepancy with what the administration is doing is that he seemed to suggest a transportation system downtown along the lines of streetcars or commuter rail (Mr. Moyes' words was a "railvolution") instead of the gondola system that the administration wants.
I also believe what Mr. Neilson of Gold's did was very gutsy. He basically stuck his hand into the hornets nest by showing up and speaking last night. I also enjoyed his explanation that he is doing what he is doing because he wanted to remain a part of Ogden. For those of you who question him on his authenticity of this statement, his words that followed when somebody asked him about a project in Farmington and also the effect on the Newgate Mall proved his real intent. He basically screamed that he didn't care about Farmington, or the Newgate Mall, orRiverdale, or for that matter any other development around downtown Ogden. He basically said that they had not cared about Ogden when it was failing and now was not the time to care about them. Another interesting point was when he said that the reason he was using the city to acquire money was that the city could could get a better rate than he could. He said that the city was basically acting as the bank in the transaction. I personally enjoyed his explanations because it had not been presented before.
I also noticed Mr. Blackson's comments at the end of the meeting. When it seemed like pandemonium was breaking out, he mentioned that we would all have to figure out how to do this together. This leads me to the tragedy of the evening. As I looked around that room and listened to comments, I realized that nearly everybody there saw the same beauty in Ogden. They all wanted to see the city improve and thrive, just as I do... They just want to go about it in a different way. It was sad to me to observe this, because in the end we all wanted what is best for their city we all love. I guess my hope (or wish I could say) is like I said in another thread here, "Just because we are on different sides of the issue, that doesn't mean that we have to be on different sides."
This is all from memory, so if I said something sketchy, let me know.
Read Mr. Blackson's article in today's newspaper. My recall of the Monday night meeting was that he basically supported the Mayor's downtown agenda and served as a mediator during the heated final stages. He likes the streetcar system rather than the aerial transportation system. I support, if done according to Hoyle, the Ogden to Snow Basin tram, but a city tram....more study is needed as I feel that mucho dinero will be spent to give few people a lift from downtown to WSU. But, on the other side of the coin, maybe a city tram will bring people to town, if it is a part of the whole "transportation network:" mass transit to Ogden, trams to the campus and Snowbasin. Interesting thoughts.
I also got the same thing from the meeting last week. I simply find it interesting that someone paid by CBCOF to come to Ogden and analyze things had something negative to say about the city's plans. When he was giving his presentation he had been in town for only a few hours and gave a presentation that sounded almost exactly like what the city is trying to do. It was only afterward that he had negative thoughts on what is going on. Sounds a little fishy and maybe biased to me.
I agree with you both, EC and UTmorMAN. I sat through Mr. Blackson's entire presentation, which was more a general seminar on "new urbanism" concepts than anything else. It seemed at the time that Mr. Blackson was entirely unaware of the exact nature of the current Ogden city plan. He hammered hard the need for Transit Oriented Development, (which seems to be all the rage in the urban planning community.) Ogden, of course has already incorporated that into the present plan. Monday's Std-Ex remarks seem to have an entirely different theme than the one Mr. Blackson presented that night in the Union Station lobby.
As for the Rec Center proposal, his only mention of it during his original presentation was that such a facility could be part of the greater redevelopment scheme, as I recall. He certainly didn't mention that he thought it "risky."
The text of Mr. Blackson's recent reported "interview" has all the markings of something that's been concocted after a week's reflection, and after the fact, it seems to me.
Perhaps our local Don Quixotes got together and reminded him that he arrived here on their dime, and that he was supposed to create controversy, as their "expert," in the "battle of the experts."
It's also possible, I guess, that he hasn't been paid yet.
By the way, UTmorMAN, I'm doing some research on this repeating "meme," that the Rec Center money will be lost (or not lost) if the project isn't started this year. I've done a couple of interviews, and hope to be able to clarify it later this week.
Stay tuned.
Thanks, I am anxious to know the results.
Yep, old Mitch had some tough going in the Monday meeting, especially when his paid consultant, Mr. or Professor Blackson presented a lecture that stood right in line with what the City is attempting to do. Then, during the re-hash, Moyes got lam-blasted even more, and I've noticed that this whole cherade has been followed by Simon and Garfunkle's, "The Sounds of Silence." Somebaody ought to cut somebody a check, I guess.
Rudi....time to scratch this one and the preceeding one too. Need fresh stuff, like: How about that City Council, voting to cancel last Tuesday's meeting, right in the middle of all this urbanization, etc. We need new faces aboard!!!!
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