OGDEN — The flap over a pending property sale to a corporation owned by would be developer Chris Peterson is one reason the city’s council and administration need to adopt a code of ethics, says Councilwoman Dorrene Jeske.Weber County Readers were of course the first to learn about the "Bootjack" sweetheart deal. Gentle reader Ogden Red spilled the beans here first. And with all due deference to Mr. Schwebke, many of us consider the latest official indiscretion to be something more than a mere "flap."
If such a code were in place, the administration might have been required to inform the Ogden Redevelopment Agency in advance of Peterson’s involvement with Bootjack LLC, before agreeing to sell the corporation three parcels off Wall Avenue between 21st and 22nd streets, Jeske said.
The RDA approved the land sale in December, but only learned this month that Peterson owns Bootjack.
Although today's article refers to a draft proposal, Ace Reporter Schwebke offers us little of substance, aside from vague reference to some kind of "pledge":
The proposal calls for the council, Mayor Matthew Godfrey and the city administration to annually sign a pledge outlining their obligations to the public, she said.Thus we're left to speculate on the strength and breadth of the said proposal.
The pledge would require that all three entities disclose potential conflicts of interest, promise to handle land transactions honestly and perform all duties ethically, Jeske said.
As our regular readers know, government ethics is a pet topic of ours. We rant about it often. We're highly in favor, here at Weber County Forum, of anything our elected public servants can do to promote the highest ethical standards for our government officials. We thus applaud Councilwoman Jeske's interest in this subject, and offer our unflagging support for anything she can do to help clean up the ethics of certain Emerald City government officials.
And if we can offer our own suggestions, we'd urge her to incorporate these minimal requirements in any "ethics pledge" which she might propose:
• Full adherence to all existing conflicts provisions under Utah Law (Utah Code 10-3-1301 et seq.),And while we're on the subject, we do hope our city council will also devote some attention to enforcing the Utah and Emerald City legal provisions above cited. In the most recent Bootjack transaction, wherein option rights to an unmarketed RDA property were deceptively granted to a Boss Godfrey croney, Boss Godfrey may have already run afoul of existing law. Whether our asleep-at-the-wheel council will ever lift a finger to enforce any of the above provisions is another question entirely. Only time will tell, we suppose.
• Full adherence to all existing conflicts provisions under the Emerald City Municipal Code (Title 2 Chapter 7), and;
• Adoption of provisions which would prohibit acts which would constitute appearances of conflicts of interest, in addition to conflicts which are actual or potential.
So what about it, gentle readers? Who among our WCF readership would not be in favor of a robust City-wide Ethics Pledge? Would it be a good idea to adopt such a pledge -- to be taken by all elected officials, department heads and city employees? Dare we suggest that the council begin its own investigation of possible violations of currently-existing conflicts provisions?
Who will be the first to comment?
Update 2/28/09 10:38 a.m. MT: Several readers have mentioned in the below thread this morning's Standard-Examiner lead editorial. Although we thought this editorial to be weak, half-baked and lame, we link it here anyway for the convenience of those folks who don't have their own hard-copy Std-Ex edition... (that guy who logs in daily from Singapore, for instance.)
158 comments:
That the Godfrey administration needs instruction [urgently] in the area of ethical conduct is now beyond dispute. As for the proposed code of ethics mentioned in the article... well, the devil's in the details, as usual. But I'm not sure you can legislate ethics. The solution to the problem of unethical conduct by elected officials is not to elect such persons to office.
Now, if the proposed code tightens up procedures for, say, approving sale of public properties, that's something else and is definitely needed. An administration that uses the public community cable channel to support the Mayor's personal political preferences while denying air time to those who think differently, an Administration that insists that the Mayor's pipe-dream gondola will connect downtown Ogden with Snow Basin for nearly a year after the Snow Basin management had to take to the newspapers to inform people it had told the Mayor time and time again that that would not happen, an Administration that misleads the Council it must work with repeatedly, and refuses to supply information on city land sales when the Council requests it, absolutely has a problem understand what ethical conduct requires of public officials.
Of course, the Mayor does have a defense. He could argue that "my Administration has not been unethical, it's merely been incompetent." But that's the only defense with a even a hope of convincing anyone familiar with the Administration's performance in office.
Still, I'll wait to see what Councilwoman Jeske comes up with. If it focuses on city government procedures, it may be a very good idea. If it merely involves a pledge of good conduct, it will not accomplish much. Waiting to see...
While I applaude Councilmember Jeske's efforts, and wish her success in this endeavor, I think someone in power should be investigating possible infringement of State Ethics rules and be doing what they can to send our Mayor packing.
Truly ethical people don't need pledges and guidelines. The unethical will ignore these unless there are penalties attached for unethical behavior. In addition, someone has to be willing to apply the penalties.
Meanwhile the CC really needs to be taking back their powers that the previous Council gave away to the Mayor, removing Godfrey from his RDA position, and firing Bill Cook.
We believe the proposed pledge would be highly useful, so long as it's tied to conflicts rules with criminal sanctions, such as we set forth in the above article.
Such a pledge would serve an educational function, for the ethically impaired who've never devoted an instant to consciously considering the subject of ethics in government.
What's more, it would put public officials on actual notice of the existence of particular conflicts legal provisions. Moreover, it would deprive such officials who've taken such a pledge from later arguing that they didn't know they were conducting themselves unethically.
Taking an ethics pledge that's backed by criminal and administrative sanctions is far more than a mere idle act, we believe.
Read the statute and ordinances we cited. They could be tightened up; but even now they have "teeth."
The Littlest Mayor was even disingenuous in his reply to ace reporter Schwebke when he said:
"it is unfortunate that Jeske is questioning the administration’s integrity, adding that he and his staff are already required to sign disclosure statements addressing conflicts of interest and other ethical issues."
A couple of months ago I put in a GRAMA request with Ogden City asking for this very thing - Conflict of Interest Reports filed by Godfrey or any one else in his administration.
There was nothing on file. I ask them to double check as it was the state law that they be filed. The answer was: "There have been no filings from the mayor or his administration", ever?, "ever!"
How about it, does the mayor and his empty suit choir obey the law, or not? After all, he is the ethicalist person in the room at any given time.
Ozboy:
Think you can get the SE to follow this up? I would think any paper with the slightest pretentions to being an independent journal would snap it up and run with it. Wouldn't you?
So, we can legislate morality, after all? I have been told all these years you can't do that. Who woulda thunk it?
Anon:
Whooo, boy, you've opened a can of worms now. It may be possible to legislate ethical conduct ---may, I said --- I'm not convinced yet. But is that the same as legislating morality? Are "morals" and "ethics" synonymous?
Whoo, boy. Call the pizza guy and break out the beer. This has the makings of a dorm lounge all-nighter....
Well Mr. Curmudgeon, the answer is inherent in your question. The Standard doesn't have any pretentions of being an independent journal, now do they? They are a Ohio corporation owned rag that has maybe 3 oe 4 true news people left from the old Standard - or so I have been told. The rest are "new" so called news people from company headquarters. Folks that are much more interested in the beans than they are the story.
There is an occasional news piece and editorial that would give us hope that this was not the case, but nothing consistant.
Given the Standard's apparent lack of curiousity it might be a bad bet to assume that they read this blog, but if they do, maybe they will in turn file their own GRAMA request for the little big guy's proofs on his ethicalism.
Big Bill Glasmann was the production manager of the Standard back in the days when it was a real and substantial news paper. For fourty years or so he was responsible for getting the papers produced and on the door steps on time. He never failed to do this in spite of storm, flood, mud slide, earth quake, electrical outage nor any other natural or man made disaster. There was no moving part in that physical plant or press room that he was not familiar with and master of.
He didn't say a whole lot, he didn't seem to need to, but when he did speak stuff happened.
Oz:
I have more hope for the SE than you. Be interesting to see if they pick this up. Why not email your post to Schwebke or the news editor [or both] and see what happens?
As for delivery... I don't know who runs it now, but I do know that this morning when I left the house at 6:10 AM to catch the bus to work, the only footprints in the fresh snow on my driveway were from the SE delivery guy who got the paper to my door before I opened it. Yes, I was impressed.
Jeske needs to concentrate on staying awake in meetings and learning our to do due diligence on her part if she is that concerned. Three clicks of a mouse provides plenty of information on a LLC.
Dear Curm
Help me here.
When a Partnership does business under a DBA, do they do so to keep the ownership of this DBA from being public? Is this common?
If so, would the requirement of disclosure prevent other companies from ever trying to acquire property in Ogden if their ownership were required to be public knowledge?
Should all of the people on this Blog be required to make their thoughts public under their real names? They are in effect operating under a literary DBA.
I recognize why many of you are so perplexed with CP buying land. Would you also be perplexed and angry if a business owned by anyone else bought the land?
Does CP buying land not connected to the golf course or the University require this disclosure?
ANON
Perhaps we should check the color of everyone's skin before deciding whether to sell property to them.
another anon
Anon:
You asked:
Would you also be perplexed and angry if a business owned by anyone else bought the land?
Fair question. I can only answer for myself. And the answer is "yes, if the Council asked the Mayor who the purchaser was and the administration refused to supply the information." Absolutely.
From my POV, Mr. Peterson's wanting to buy the land [under his own name outright or via Bootjack LLC] is not a problem. The problems from my POV are the administration's refusing the information the Council [RDA board] asked for, and the possibility that Bootjack was not asked to do what it appears that other purchasers of city or RDA land are routinely asked to do: make their plans for the land known prior to purchase, and [third] the apparent lack of attempts to invite others to bid on the land so that the city could be certain it was getting the best price for a public asset.
And yes, I'd be just as concerned about those matters if Fred Smith or Clem Kadiddlehopper had made the purchase offer instead of Chris Peterson via Bootjack.
Dear Curm
Honest answer.
Did the council ask who bootjack was?
Why do people use DBA's
If disclosure is required do you think companies will choose not to do business with Ogden?
Whould you expect the new DISCLOSURE laws apply to private transactions?
Do you think the the DBA's on the blog should be eliminated. Is there a possibllity that there are conflicts of interest amount all of us?
ANON
The 'code' must have sanctions or else the code is toothless as an old lion.
One cannot compare anonymity on the blog to full disclosure of on matters before the administration.
What a blogger says does not affect the welfare of the citizens.
Everyone here is just spouting off.
But WAIT! I'm forgetting that Godfrey has more integrity than anyone else in the room. Shame on you, Mrs. Jeske. And, the mayor tipped his ethical hand when he declared that 'gov't entitities have the right to make deals in private, but the outcome is always public.'
The outcome is always made public after the fact!
Anonymous:
Godfrey is a known close associate of Peterson. They've travelled Europe together. Godfrey's been actively peddling Peterson's projects for over a year. Some would call them joint venturers. Others might even reasonably regard Godfrey as Peterson's agent-in-fact. At the very least, they've demonstrably acted concertedly and publicly over a considerabe period of time to advance Peterson's interests.
Under circumstances well known to all of us, the relationship between Peterson and Godfrey is anything but arms-length.
As such, the identity of Peterson as the purchaser ought to have been voluntarily disclosed. With this information in hand, the council could have made an informed decision on the option contract, and could have determined intelligently whether Peterson was receiving preferential treatment. Voluntary disclosure would have lessened accusations of a conflict of interest, and would have invoked inquiry into the adeqacy of the sale price. In truth, the subsequent disclosure of Peterson's identity evidences the fact that the administration knew it would create problems. And in point of fact, one un-named city official even revealed that the adminstration intentionally withheld disclosure because it knew the transaction would be "controversial."
Voluntary disclosure was ethically necessary in this instance, particularly in view of the fact that the subject property was apparently never actively advertised for sale, equipped with signage or listed on the open market (the MLS,) thus raising the issue as to whether the option price represented fair market value.
This transaction is highly suspect for many reasons; but the stealth involvement of an undisclosed Godfrey croney principal is chief among them.
And yes. "Corporate shells" and "straw-men" are a common means of concealing the identities of principals in many transactions. The use of these contrivances is particularly common in Utah. That this tactic would used this ruse in the current circumstance is by no means surprising.
And no. Anonymous blog commentators are not ethically required to disclose their true identities, although a prudent RDA board CAN refuse to do business with them until they come out from their cover.
And no. Discrimination on the basis of skin color is prohibited by the Federal Constitution in special cases. Peterson could claim no unlawful discrimination of a rational but adverse RDA decision unless he were a member of a recognized "suspect class", had his identity been revealed. The council would be free to discriminate against Peterson on the basis of a bad shoe shine under American law. Discriminating against Peterson because he's a Godfrey croney would have been completely lawful. Gotta admit though, that your "skin color" objection was "cute."
Rudi also thinks you're playing "intentionally dumb."
And yes. Legitimate companies won't mind disclosing the identies of their principals.
And that's the kind of companies we want doing business in Emerald City, right?
Companies who are completely above-board?
Thanks for playing.
Next!
Understand Garcia told Jeske that He had a code...written by Cook....ready to be laid forth.
Why the secrecy on his/their part? Why not cooperate with Jeske? Why not invite her and the other council members to
write' the code?
Cook can't be trusted. Sheeesh...last guy..well, other than Godfrey, to go to for an ethics code.
Jeske seems to be calling for 'openness' and Garcia didn't involve the whole council in coming up with an ethics code. Don't see much 'openness' here.
Anon, DBA is not a guarantee of anonimity, it only provides cover from the casual observer. All principals and officers would have to appear in the articles of incorporation. The limited liability is also pretty much a sham,in that it offers personal protection from corporate misdeeds and bad financial decisions.Sort of like irresponsability can be rewarding.
Dear Rudi
You continue to insinuate that the Mayor and CP are close friends.
Why is the Mayor more connected with CP than the Boyer Corp. or Larry Miller or any number of companies that come to Ogden to attempt to do business.
Ogden has an economic developement dept. Is the Mayor or anyone else involved with economic developement suddenly a cronie to someone that needs assistence in getting a business venture started in Ogden?
Was the Mayor doing his due diligence when he traveled to Europe to check on the gondola proposal?
Should he have left CP to tell him what was or was not possible? I think not.
The economic developement dept last week assisted a person in purchasing 9 buildings in Ogden. Did anyone have lunch with the person that bought the buildings? Shoould they have? Does that make the cronies?
ANON
"You continue to insinuate that the Mayor and CP are close friends.
No. We said the two were obvious cronies.
We suggest write it down so you don't forget it again.
"Why is the Mayor more connected with CP than the Boyer Corp. or Larry Miller or any number of companies that come to Ogden to attempt to do business."
Good question. It must be something more than good business. Peterson obviously isn't a big "player," after all. All the more evidence that something strange is happening re Peterson, we guess.
(Maybe it's the Perry Commo haircut.)
"Was the Mayor doing his due diligence when he traveled to Europe to check on the gondola proposal?"
From the sound of the story... Boss Godfrey took a European junket. MAny questions remain unanswered about THAT trip.
"Blah, blah, blah?"
Who knows? Only the Godfrey annointed could know the answwrs to these questions.
(how bout you fill in the blanks here, son)
"...Is the Mayor or anyone else involved with economic developement suddenly a cronie [sic] to someone that needs assistence in getting a business venture started in Ogden?"
No. Did Godfrey put on a year-long 24/7 dog and pony for anyone else who worked with the economic development Depertment, we ask?
"...they have? Does that make the cronies?"
No.
CP is special... for reasons that are yet unfathomable.
Oh durn! Outta questions so soon?
Next!
Dear Rudi
For a guy that encourages that questions be asked, You seem to get very exersized by them.
ANON
Anon:
You asked:
Did the council ask who bootjack was?
According to news reports, and statements of Council members, the Council did ask, and the administration did not answer. If you mean should the Council acting as RDA Board gone looking itself: probably so. But it asked the Administration, and there was so far as I can see no sensible reason for the Administration not to have replied. That's the most puzzling thing about all this. Withholding the information made no sense that I can see and simply created the opening for all the speculation that is now going on, plus it antagonized Council members. For heaven's sake, why? What was to be gained by not answering the request? Beats me.
Why do people use DBA's.
Is this a serious question? For all kinds of perfectly ligitimate reasons. For example [and only one], I buy a business that has established a "good will" identity in the market, say "Momma's Pies and Pizzas." It's part of what I'm buying, that established name and the good will attached to it. Be dumb to change it to "Curmudgeons Pies and Pizzas." So I acquire the business as Curmudgeon DBA "Mommas Pies and Pizzas." Surely you know this.
If disclosure is required do you think companies will choose not to do business with Ogden?
Doing business with a public body --- city, town or state --- particularly when it involves the sale of public property may well involve, and should involve, a higher standard for disclosure than a private owner to private owner transaction might. I can think of no good reason for a city to maintain in public that it intends to sell public land, but it cannot reveal the buyer. Yes, dealing with public entities is different and does and should require a higher level of disclosure than a purely private transaction.
Whould you expect the new DISCLOSURE laws apply to private transactions?
I'm not sure what new disclosure laws you mean, since I don't think any new disclosure ordinances have yet been proposed. But I don't mean to dodge the question and, knowing nothing in detail about any proposed ordinance, I'd say the answer to your question is "no, the requirements for a sale of public property do not necessarily have to be applied to purely private transactions." But I also note that under current Utah law, when you register an LLC or business DBA, ownership is already required to be a matter of public record.
Do you think the the DBA's on the blog should be eliminated? Is there a possibllity that there are conflicts of interest amount all of us?
No, pseudonymns should not be abolished, for reasons that have been discussed here several times. And there is no conflict of interest since we're not doing business with each other on the blog. Though what I suspect you mean rather than "conflict of interest" is this: is it possible people blogging here have hidden agendas driving their posts that the people reading their posts don't know about? Could Mayor Godfrey himself be posting here under a pseudonym? Could Mr. Peterson, or could SmartGrowthOgden supporters? Easy answer: Yes, of course they could. And as for the last example [SGO supporters], they are. [One right here.] Which is why anyone who reads blog postings needs to keep a snuff bag of skepticism handy and do a little dip every now and then.
But we're not doing business with each other on the basis of postings, so "conflict of interest" hardly comes into play. Anyone who would sign a contract blind with an anon. poster or a pseudonymned one is already probably broke because of all the money orders he sent to the widow of the deposed Nigerial oil minister who needed help getting her inherited money out of the country.
Rudi:
Don't forget Utah Code 67-16-1 et seq.
Whether or not a trip to Europe constitutes "compensation" is the open question here.
In any case, the appearance of conflict of interest is strong enough that a 67-16-6 disclosure *should have* been filed. Further, the fact that the RDA Executive Director and Economic Development Head were both "sparing with the truth" before City Council should be prima facie evidence of wrongdoing.
In other words, ANON, the whole thing stinks to high heaven.
By the way, I'd be happy to reveal my real, true, given Christian name, if you can get my employer and the city administration to sign a statement that I will in no way be persecuted for my statements in this forum. Short of that, I remain
Yours
Monotreme
p.s. Shall I take you through the steps for obtaining a proper pseudonym? It doesn't seem to have made an impression on you in the first two attempts.
Sorry, the first three paragraphs were meant to be addressed to Rudi; the last two and the P.S. to ANON.
"p.s. Shall I take you through the steps for obtaining a proper pseudonym? It doesn't seem to have made an impression on you in the first two attempts."
Enlightening, innit, Monotreme?
The typical Godfreyite/Gondoist doesn't typically have the intellect to navigate through a radio button and coupla screens to select their own unique screen name.
It's neanderthals we're dealing with here, No?
I was amused when Curt Geiger was postin here recently.
The dope would login as anonymous, and then begin his message with:
"This is Curt Geiger."
Obviously a numbskull.
The guy couldn't follow instructions on the can to open a can of soup.
This dolt is Matthew Godfrey's think-tank brainiac, BTW.
Whew!
Rory:
He, he came, he spoke, engaged on whatever it was we were discussing and identified himself. Good enough for me. And going "anon" is the fasted way to post. That probably accounts some for its popularity. Especially since I routinely have to do the verification letters two, and sometimes three times before my post is accepted. It's just lots faster to go anon.
give it a rest curm.
rory was just poking fun at geiger!
Curmudgeon, how do you find the time to write so many posts? Especially so many LENGTHY posts? You must be retired.
I think you still have to do the friggen letter verification whether you use a name or go anonymous.
Using anonymous only gives you the advantage of not having to type in a name - real or otherwise.
The do it twice nature of the letter verification is a giant pain in the ass. It appears that google who runs this blog site could give a shit less about the inconvenience of this problem. It has come and gone and been around enough times that they have had plenty of opportunity to fix it for good.
Rudi sez:
"Enlightening, innit, Monotreme?
The typical Godfreyite/Gondoist doesn't typically have the intellect to navigate through a radio button and coupla screens to select their own unique screen name.
It's neanderthals we're dealing with here, No?"
Really. (Or, should I say, "true dat"?) I'm proud of the fact that, in general, I can teach anybody anything. I even did a stint as an animal trainer for a while.
Sadly, this person (or these people) are making me wonder about my abilities.
Got any cheese?
Is that you, Bobby?
A tint as an animal trainer..on the 9th floor?
Since you can teach anyone 'anything'...how abut a crash course in 'ethics, honesty, integrity, and obeying the law and upholding the Constitution.....to the slugs in the City Bldg? (You'd be animal training, for sure).
Anon:
You wrote: Curmudgeon, how do you find the time to write so many posts? Especially so many LENGTHY posts? You must be retired.
Not quite. Working part time. And much of the work I do at home is eposodic and at my desk, where I take five or ten minute breaks now and then when I finish something and before I start the next block of work. I check a few blogs I post on. [WCF and a few national.] Kind of recreation, a nice brief break from the routine.
Plus I'm a quick typist. [The best advice I got in HS when prepping to go to college was to take a course in typing. Damn good advice then. Now it would be keyboarding, but still very good advice for the college bound.] And much of what I do for work involves writing or editing so I'm practiced at it. In short, doesn't take much time at all. Occasionally, if I need to do some research for a post, I'll compose it on a word processor and store it, revist, add and edit, until it's ready [sometimes it takes a few days]. Then I post.
But thanks for asking....
Dear Curm
I have to ask you your opinion.
If the members of the City Council approved the sale of the property to Boot Jack they must have thought it was a good price and a fair deal for the city.
If some of the members of the Ogden City Council would have not approved of the sale if they had know it was CP, then would that have been discrimination against CP?
Would you concider the change of heart toward the sale because it was CP buying the property discrimination?
Would such a change in the vote (TO NO) because of who is making the offer be ethical?
Was the sale of the property, regardless of who bought it ethical? If it was not a good deal was the City Council unethical no matter who was buying the property.
ANON
anon.
the whole deal for that property is that the mayor did not put it out for bid. He just handed the property to cp and that is the problem, as you may know that competition will bring out the better price and maybe also a better plan. but there is no bidding on this property and that is the big big problem.
so you tell me is that ethical.
Dear ITYSS
The question of the ethical procedure used in making this transaction is but one of the issues. If the proceedure was unethical how often is this proceedure used?
If it is often used or only used once, was the City Council complicit in the unethical behavior?
The issue as you stated, is not who bought the property but possibly the system. Under that
understanding then the Council is a guilty as the Mayor and may be guilty of many unethical transactions.
ANON
As far as I can tell, the RDA Board (aka City Council) approved the sale of the Bloom's property to Bootjack because the RDA staff (aka Mayor Godfrey and/or his subordinates) said it was an emergency, we need the money now to cover additional expenses at the Junction.
Put yourself in the position of an RDA Board member. If you vote no, you're an obstructionist causing further delays in the Junction construction (and possibly further delay-related expenses). If you vote yes, you're approving the sale of a prime piece of downtown real estate to an unknown entity for an unknown purpose.
The real problem here is that the RDA Director and his staff are guilty of insubordination. The Director is supposed to answer to the RDA Board. The Board asked for more information and the Director (or his subordinates) refused to provide it. And sadly, this isn't the first time that the Director has treated his Board in this way. He regularly gives them the mushroom treatment, keeping them in the dark on all sorts of projects that he has in the works. And every time he persuades them to vote for something without understanding it, I'm sure he gleefully chuckles to himself as he drives home and goes to bed.
Has anyone noticed how in the news coverage of this fiasco, there's no mention of the RDA Director? Instead his subordinate, Harmer, is made to be the fall guy and talk to the press. Problem is, the RDA Board has no direct control over Harmer; he answers to the Director, not to the Board. We need to focus attention on the RDA Director, where it belongs.
Dear S
So you are saying that the RDA and the CC voted to do something that they new as unethical or possibly illegal for expediency.
Is expediency and excuse for this behavior. If it is an excuse then the same forgiveness should be extended to the Director who saw the same expediency.
ANON
From the public's standpoint I think that the fact that the administration concealed information from the CC was highly unethical, it definitely supercedes the "procedural" issues that you mention (although that might be a problem, not saying that it is, but it's not unethical).
Anon:
I'll tackle the questions, but you seem to be focusing on "who" bought the property which was not my major problem with the sale. Mr. Peterson has as much right to bid [yes, word chosen deliberately] for surplus city property offered [yes, word chosen deliberately] as anyone else. The problem, or one of them, arises because [let's call him "the buyer" and leave the name out] seems to have been the only one to know that the land was available for sale, the only one who make a purchase offer, and it seems, did not file a plan for what he wanted to do with the land if he got it [which I am now informed is usually required of people offering to buy land from the city in an RDA zone and develop it]. It's looking more and more like "special treatment" for the buyer. That's the problem for me. Not necessarily who the buyer was.
But, to your questions:
If the members of the City Council approved the sale of the property to Boot Jack they must have thought it was a good price and a fair deal for the city.
To which I and I think at least some members of the RDA board, would reply that they made the decision without having from the Administration all the information about the sale that they should have had, and were under some pressure to act quickly, in fact immediately, because the RDA needed the quarter million from the sale for work on the parking structure at the mall. With full information and time to consider it, I don't know if they would have made the same decision. The point is, they didn't have the time [the administration insisted] because of the Mall construction problem, and they weren't provided with all the information they should have had. So your question then turns into a kind of hypothetical one: "If the Council had had all the information it could have been given, and if the members had time to consider it and ask for more if necessary, would they have still voted to approve the sale?" Answer: beats me.
If some of the members of the Ogden City Council would have not approved of the sale if they had know it was CP, then would that have been discrimination against CP?
Well that one is truly a hypothetical question. I'll answer it, but I want to make sure I am reading it the way you intended. So let me put it this way: "If a City Council member, fully informed about the details of the sale in timely fashion, including the plans the buyer had for development, and had not problem with any of that, but voted no only because the buyer was named Peterson, then that would in my view constitute a poor decision, an unwise vote." That answer it? I'd add, though, that given the conditions as I put them, I doubt any of the Council members I'm familiar with would have voted "no" just because the buyer was named Peterson.
Would you concider the change of heart toward the sale because it was CP buying the property discrimination?
Discrimination is a legal term, with quite precise [and loaded] meanings in the US today. I would say, as above, if the only reason a member voted "no" on the sale was because the buyer's name was Peterson, he or she would have cast an unwise vote. But [again] I don't think that would have happened.
Would such a change in the vote (TO NO) because of who is making the offer be ethical? It would be unwise and unwarranted. Unethical? I'm hard put to call votes by representatives unethical unless they've been bought and paid for, which we are not discussing in this instance.
Was the sale of the property, regardless of who bought it ethical? If it was not a good deal was the City Council unethical no matter who was buying the property.
You have a lot wrapped up in this one, several issues merged together. Was the sale ethical on its merits? I don't know. Was the buyer given special privileges not available to others? Did he know the property was available because of some relationship [personal, political, or business] with administration members? That is, did he have access, whoever he might be, to information about public land that was not available to others? Was he permitted to buy RDA land without informing the RDA board of his plans for development [as is the usual practice in Ogden when land in an RDA is sold to a developer]? If the administration provided him with special access, special information, and special treatment, then no, the sale was not conducted ethically by the administration. If you are trying to get me to say the RDA board acted unethically in approving the sale, I'd say at this point, absolutely not since the members did not get the information about the sale that they should have gotten from the Mayor's office. They may have acted imprudently [though I notice they did ask for more information and it was not forthcoming] or hastily, but not so far as we know so far, unethically.
That do it for you?
Now let me pose a question for you in another post.
Question for Anon:
Here's my problem with all of this. Let's presume, for the sake of argument, that nothing underhanded [on the part of the Godfrey administration] went on or was intended. This was a straight-up good for the city sale, nothing else. Let's take that as given.
Then I can't understand why the sale wasn't handled this way. This is how I, were I Mayor in this circumstance, have done it. Called my staff together and said:
"OK, people, I'm going to recommend to the City Council that we sell this land to Mr. Peterson. Now Peterson is associated with me as a supporter of the Gondola idea, and the Mt. Ogden Parklands matter. He is a controversial figure just now. So on this sale we need to make sure we are holier than the Pope, cleaner than a hound's tooth. Cross every T, dot every I. I don't want even a hint of suspicion that Peterson is getting special treatment, and if anyone claims that, I want the evidence in hand to squash the claim like a bug."
"So, here's what I want done. I want a notice put in the papers, in the usual place for city notices, that these parcels are surplus properties, that we've received a purchase offer, and that 30 days from the first appearance of the notice, I'm going to act on the offer. Anyone else who might want to bid on the land is welcome to make an offer before the 30 days are up and we'll then consider what's best to do. The notice doesn't have to say who made the offer or the price he offered, just that we've had one on these parcels. "
"Second, our usual practice in selling RDA land is to ask buyers how they will develop the land. We have to ask the same of Mr. Peterson. He's talked to me about what he wants to do with the land, but that's not good enough. We'll need a statement from him about what he plans to do with the land, in writing two weeks before the deadline, so I can get it to the RDA board in time for them to look it over carefully."
"What was that question again? What do we do if the RDA board wants to know who made the offer? Tell them. If it's not one of the Council leadership, tell the member who asked and copy Garcia and Wicks on our reply. Tell them all if they have any questions about the pending sale, and we don't have the information, we'll get it and get it to them ASAP."
"Make it so, people."
Had that been done [or something like it], in my opinion, this whole brouhaha could and would have been avoided.
So here's my question: if there was no skullduggery, no special treatment for Mr. Peterson involved in all this, if it was a straight up good deal for the city, why wasn't that, or something like it, done?
Good heavens! Curmudgeon doing Little Matty Godfrey is like Pat Robertson doing Jello Biafra. Little Matty doesn't care about ethics, moral conduct, honesty or the wishes of his constituency; Little Matty is following a vision from God about gondolas and fancy castles built without roads. He's not going to let the public trust interfere with that divine mission, and he's told us all so on numerous occasions. And please, quite giving credence to coded and illiterate ramblings by using your own heavy-handed and condescending brand of "fairness" and "logic" in your retorts. It makes us all look silly.
Jason:
Two things: (a) You wrote "Curmudgeon doing Little Matty Godfrey is like Pat Robertson doing Jello Biafra." Love it! Still chuckling.
(b)You wrote: "And please, quit giving credence to coded and illiterate ramblings by using your own heavy-handed and condescending brand of "fairness" and "logic" in your retorts. It makes us all look silly."
Well, we're going to have to agree to disagree on this. I can see people seeing the posted questions, left unanswered except by sarcasm [and I agree, the temptation is great] concluding there were no good answers. So I made a stab at answering them. So did others. "Heavy handed and condescending" --- possibly. Matter of judgement. I suspect yours would disagree with mine on this. But I'm not sure what "heavy handed fairness" might be, or "condescending fairness" either.Yes, I attempt fairness in posts. Might not always achieve it, but it's worth trying for. And if the attempt makes anyone look silly, it can only be me, not "all of us."
"Like Pat Robertson doing Jello Biafra..." STILL laughing....
ANON: Is your 11:07 post directed to me? If so, I'd like to remind you that I never used the words unethical or illegal. Please quit putting words into my mouth.
Anon 2-
Dan S
After reading the post, it is clear that Anon was not putting words in your mouth, but rather asking you a question.
No need to be so senstive.
Anon 2
Ya Dan.
Quit making assumptions of Anon.
Why is it that so often people can't see in the mirror the exact thing they think they are trying not to be?
Jason W
So true. Godfrey has a special mission...just look at the first syllable of his last name! An Omen? A divine calling from above?
G grandiose
O onerous
D dictator
F fetid
R reckless
E evil
Y yellow belly
Some of us see him in a more worldly way.
Dear Curm
I will atttmpt to give my take on your question.
I believe there is a possibility that the administration needed to get the money. I believe that the administration feared that if the name CP were attached to the purchase that the vote on the sale would have been tabled and perhaps tabeled for months while the politics played out.
I also believe that the ecomonic developement dept has a plan for the city that is far reaching. If bids are always used, a property needed for the project to be completed, might be purchased by someone who would stop the project because his use of the property does not fit the model or perhaps hold the city ransom.
I suspect that all citys hold this card when planning the developement of the city. Has anyone called other city's to see what proceedure they use.
There was a piece of land owned by the city that was reciently sold to Frecinius. (12.6 acres) The city needed to make sure that Frecinius got the land. If Frecinius did not get the land to expand they would be forced to move from Ogden. No bidding was allowed or asked for. The City council voted to sell public land without a bid. I have yet to see anyone on this blog raise even an eyebrow.
That is why I suspect that the real issue is CP not the sell of 3 acres of land without bids.
ANON
Anon above
Are you Stephenson or Safsten??
I don't think cronyism was a factor with Fresenius. Also, the Council was apprised of what was going on according to your post.
Also, the Council knew what the property was being used for.
No similarities.
Anon:
Just two comments:
(a)"If bids are always used, a property needed for the project to be completed, might be purchased by someone who would stop the project because his use of the property does not fit the model or perhaps hold the city ransom."
You presume that the policy would be "the highest bid will be the winning bid." But the standard used by the city is broader than that. It's something like "no lower than appraised value and best benefit for the city." So if a bid came in higher, but for a purpose the City administration deemed inappropriate, the administration could still recommened to the RDA accepting the lower bid on "best benefit" grounds. But it would have to explain, of course, why the lower-bid project was preferable. Simply put, when dealing with public property, greater openness is, I think, always wiser than less. Which brings me to my second point.
(b)If the Administration's goal in handling the sale the way it did was to minimize controversy and dissent and "politics" [very broadly defined]... well, didn't work out that way, now, did it?
In short, I think on this one the Administration shot itself in the foot. And has by misleading the Council [you can dispute that that was the intent, if you like, but I can tell you from communications I've had with Council members who often support administration proposals, that that is how they see it] created substantial mistrust of the Administration that was not there, at least to the degree it is now, before.
Thanks for replying, anon. Now, my driveway and a snowshovel await....
"Has anyone called other city's [sic] to see what proceedure they use."
I've called several Ogden RDA trustees. None of them no nuttin' from nuttin.'
Strange ainnit... since they're the governing board of the Ogden RDA entity?
Is there anyone whom you'd recommend we contact so as we can get the straight skinny?
Bill Glasmann, perhaps?
Try Layton, Clearfield, Farmington,or any other city hereabouts that seems to be prospering.
Call Scott Brown, when he's not ogling his laptop.
Help! I'm being ganged up on by all the anons!
All right, I'll take it to be a question: Am I "saying that the RDA [Board, aka City Council] voted to do something that they [k]new [to be] unethical or possibly illegal for expediency"?
No, that wasn't what I was saying. They certainly made the decision out of expediency. Was it unethical for them to do so? That's a tough question on which opinions might differ, and I don't have time to get into it, nor do I think it would be productive to do so at this point. Was it illegal on their part? Most certainly not.
Again, though, I think our main concern here should be with the RDA Director (aka Mayor Godfrey), not with the RDA Board. The RDA Director has shown a pattern of refusing to provide information to his Board, and is otherwise making their jobs extremely difficult. In this respect he's not doing the job he was hired to do, and he should be held accountable.
Dear Observer
How do you know there was no "cronyism" with Frecinius.
Did anyone in the Administration have lunch with anyone from their company?
Did the Mayor favor the sale?
THE CITY SOLD 12 ACRES OF CITY LAND TO A PRIVATE COMPANY WITHOUT A BID.
The only thing different is that CP had nothing to do with the property.
ANON
Dan S.
What was difficult about their decision with regard to the 21st street sale? They voted unanymously without blinking.
They accepted the terms of the sale.
It only became difficult for them when Chris Peterson's name came up.
If their job is to stop Chris Peterson, then yes the Mayor has made it difficult.
Nice try anon, comparing the Frecinius deal with Bootjack is like comparing GUPPIES to MARLINS. The Frecinius deal was quite a bit more complicated as it also involved Weber Co. Schools,bus garage I think,that had to be relocatd, and all aspects of the deal were conducted in the open. That deal had no clandestine element what so ever. May also be good to note, all this ski hub stuff will never amount to what an asset for employment Frecinius is for Ogden, combined. Why would you even go there?
Rudy' format changed, I will have to fix this,I don't want to be anon. Bill C.(just a Guppie)
Dear Anon
What are you talking about.
The SKI HUB has brought $25Million in salaries to Ogden.
The ONLY DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FRECINIUS and Boot Jack is that Chris Peterson is involved in Boot Jack.
Listen closely; The City of Ogden sold 12 acres of public land to a private company without a bid.
The City of Ogden sold to Boot Jack 3 acres of public land without a bid. Many (most) of you are screeming that this has nothing to do with CP. Most of you are saying you are upset that the city did not get an open bid process.
If CP is not the issue then you should be equally and angered about both sales.
Has anyone checked into how owns Frecinius. Does anyone in the Holding or Peterson family own stock in Frecinius?
Where is the full disclosure?
ANON
Why don't the anons see that the issue for many posting here is not that the sale went to CP, but rather how Godfrey and his office refused to provide the information requested. My fav line from the SE was that the info was kept quite because if people had known who the buyer was it would've created a controversy. Yes, that is democratic government in action. Keep things secret if you think they are controversial.
Dear publius
If what you are saying is controversial, then you publish your thoughts under a phony name so that you cannot be held accountable. You are right! Democracy at work.
ANON
If it is believed that the Mayor has violated the law by abusing his public office to benefit himself for Chris Peterson at the city's expense, then he should be charged with a crime.
Ms. Jeske, Mr. Garcia or Ms. Wicks should charge him.
We should apply pressure just as we did with the police department issue.
There will be a subsequent investigation, and we'll see how it shakes out.
Some of the questions that will surely be asked:
1) Was the land sold for fair market value?
2) Did the city council accept the terms of the agreement?
3) Is it the council's right to know the owners of an LLC as an LLC is by definition a legal entity of its own?
4) What were the revenues of the sale used for?
The difficulty will be that the land was sold for fair market value. The council accepted the terms of the agreement unanymously. There is no legal right to the ownership of the LLC, but the council does have the perrogotive to not cell to the LLC if they don't want to ratify the sale. The council did ratify the sale however. And, the revenue from the sale went to support the completion of a major civic project on the mall site. Its a difficult case to build that the Mayor or Chris Peterson have done something illegal or unethical.
Then, the question is...
Does our City Council treat potential investors in Ogden equitably and in accordance with ordinance and law. Does our council discriminate against you if they don't like you or if they don't like your business?
It's a matter of ethics and law. Chris Peterson is a viable investor. Neither he nor the Mayor violated any law. His projects and investments must operate within the city ordinance structure.
Charge these guys with a crime, and accept the outcome of the ensuing investigation.
All involved will look as silly as they did with the previous charges associated with the police officer.
Turns out, the Mayor was clean and the police officer shook people down for their wallets.
Dear WCF
It is interesting reading all of this crazyness.
If the Mayor were trying to trick everyone, there was a simple process.
Have someone other than Chris Peterson buy the property.
After the closing have the person that bought the property sell it to Chris Peterson.
It is so simple that it begs the question; Was the Mayor or anyone else trying to hide anything.
Curt Geiger
Anon obviously doesn't "want to get it". He thinks that it is perfectly OK for the mayor to skulk around and deal out city property to his pals in secret with no bids. You can all keep coming back to the plain truth of this matter and Anon will keep going back to his simplistic postition that it is all about hating Criss Peterson, not about above board dealing (or lack thereof) by the mayor.
Anon must be a little thick through the skull to keep comparing Fresnius to Peterson. Seems like Fresnius is a big multi million dollar company that pumps a large payroll into Ogden every day. Peterson on the other hand contributes nothing to the city's bottom line, and just the opposite. He and this inane non-project has sucked off a huge amount of tax payer money dealing with it. Simply put, Fresnius is a big contributor to our economy, Chriss Peterson is a giant leach. None of the Godfreyites can see that difference because they just don't want to. It doesn't fit in with their vision of paradise.
Another perplexing question about the RDA, its board, and its director. The RDA is a multi million dollar corporation with a lot of assets. I have heard it is a $50 to $70 million dollar operation. Does any one incidently know what the RDA is worth, or is that another Godfrey secret?
Anyway, my point is that an operation of that size that has to sell off prime appreciating assets in order to raise a relatively small amount of quick cash to shore up another mega million dollar project that apparently is in trouble - seems to be pretty poorly managed. Just what do Harmer, Brown, Patterson et al do for their $100,000 plus each salaries? What kind of incompetent management do we have running our publicly owned corporation?
Godfrey and his whole circle of empty suits wouldn't last a week in the corporate world. Without free tax payer money to play with none of them could hold the jock of the average mid level corporate executive.
Meanwhile our elected council people, who are the board members of our corporation, seem to be clueless and powerless to stand up to Godfrey and represent the interests of the stake holders. This is their main job vis-a-vis the RDA. They very clearly are not fulfilling their responsibilities as a board of directors.
It is a sad situation where this group of incompetents are good enough for the tax payers, where if they were in private industry the whole sorry lot of them would be kicking horse turds down a dusty road.
To Curt Geiger,
I can't agree with your assessment that there is craziness going on. In fact the dialog has been rather civil considering the general opinion of what's taken place.
You're absolutely right; the deal could have been structured that way. But I frankly, give you more credit to figure that out than the people that did the deal.
I am confident that most people's problem with the deal revolves around the fact that there was a lack of public process to validate the value of the property and the fact that this property was sold without any determined or purposed use for it nor the timing of that use, a condition requirement of all other sales.
Of additional concern to me, is the fact that the city had identified this property for future development and then switched horses mid-stream so to speak and sold the property. What changed? The city has been buying up property in the general vicinity now for a couple of years and with the frontrunner coming, I question the decision to sell this property by the city to anyone.
I also question the value of the sale in the scheme of things when the city only netted $65,000 dollars from the sale not the $270,000 sales price. The money generated from this sale will not provide much contribution to the stated needed cause, that of covering the shortfalls at the Mall project. The lost opportunity for a $65,000 gain to me was not a wise business decision by the city when one considers the potential of the sold property.
The withholding of information from the Board, the lack of consistency in process and the abandonment of the property’s future potential is where I feel that the administration has made this look as though Mr. Peterson received special treatment. Frankly, I can’t disagree.
Anonymous at 5:02:
Were you there at the December 12 RDA meeting? How do you know nobody blinked?
If Peterson's name made anything difficult for anybody, I'd say it was for the RDA Director and his staff. They're the ones who knew the name and refused to disclose it.
By the way, I suppose many on this blog have noticed the irony. December 12 was the day Dian passed away. Had she been with us, she would undoubtedly have attended that December 12 meeting and, though the outcome may have been the same, we all would have known the next day that the RDA had voted to sell the Bloom's property to an unknown entity for an unknown purpose. I know I would have been very troubled by this even without knowing it had anything to do with Peterson--and I bet I'm not the only one. But instead we were all preoccupied with Dian, and with the Dean Martinez firing. I believe the Standard-Examiner did report on the sale, but not in enough detail for anyone to discern that the RDA Director had refused to disclose the identity of the buyer and his intended use for the property.
Anon said "Turns out, the Mayor was clean and the police officer shook people down for their wallets."
I dare to guess that you don’t know all of the facts surrounding the Police Officer Matt Jones recent firing. There is absolutely no evidence that he stole wallets from people. READ the DAMN County Attorney report!!!
We all know that if you give a bunch of sleazy politicians around six months to let the heat cool down, that they can come up with anything they want to fire a person. Which is exactly what they did. Thank God the Council saw through the Mayors feeble attempt to dissolve the Civil Service Commission last year, when he paid the lobbyist $45,000.00, when that was the only bill he got through the legislature. What a bargain for the Ogden taxpayer, NOT.
With the Godfrey regime in place not one of the City employees are safe from phony charges and intimidation tactics, oh, unless your on the A team like Mr. Porno/Harassment Scott Brown. His wrong doings are swept under the rug, just like all of the dirty dishonest lack of information that Godfrey supplies or doesn’t supply to the Council. Everything is an emergency with him, it has to be done right now, who has time to do due diligence when the bus is about to run over their head? And to top it off Dean Martinez who is attempting to investigate the Scott Brown injustices, he gets canned, for what? Trying to do the right thing.
Bottom line. Mayor Godfrey is deceitful, he hasn’t been honest with the taxpayers, or the Council, he has caused more hate and discontent in this community than any other public official than I can remember. Sorry about the rampage, but Godfrey and his cronies has got to go, yesterday.
I won't pretend to know all the facts,but I would hope that multiple complaints of sexual harasment could be swept under the rug, or that delaying an investigation can be doing anyone any good. Judging from the Tribune's article,there's more than enough there to comand serious attention,and promtly. I might guess that 60% or more of the employees at city hall are female. Foot draging on this one is bad for the accused,accusers and all of the women employed by the city, hell, for that matter, all women.
Correction, I meant to say "could not be swept under the rug."
Everything is so rotten here that Ogden must be in Denmark.
Smells worse than an open fish market on an August day along with the odiferous dog food plant.
Ya.
Well, Ogden taxpayers aren't the only ones being hoodwinked.
Tuesday evening I received a phone call from Dan Jones Survey team that was presented as an official North Ogden City poll.
Because I own a house in North Ogden, I was asked a long list of questions such as did I live North of 3100 North in North, what my age and income are, number in the family, etc.
The questions that were asked for me to rate included:
approval for $300,000. to put a glass enclosure around the aquatic pool, a million plus for improving one park, another $400,000. to acquire land from Chambers for another park, another $300,00. for a new shop building, another $500,000. for a walking trail and the questions went on and on so fast that I couldn't write them down quick enough.
It hit me that this poll was targeting the higher income residents North of 3100 North.
The total amount came to quite a few million dollars that I was asked to approve or disprove.
I contacted a City Council member because I was not for any of the items being promoted.
I was told that the Survey was not done by the North Ogden City Council and the Council member had not seen the questions.
I was told that the Survey was paid for by the Pool Committee and not North Ogden.
So now I understand the plan - the Pool Committee will present their Dan Jones Survey to the next Council meeting and state that the majority of North Ogden residents want these things when we have never had a chance to hear about them nor to vote on them.
This is what happened when the North Ogden RDA circumvented the wishes of 67% of North Ogden voters who voted NO on a bond issue to build the aquatic center in 2005.
The RDA ignored the 67% vote and spent the sales tax revenue from Acres RDA Project for the next 20 years to build a pool that taxpayers didn't want.
The pool is a Mickey Mouse unenclosed child's toy pool which 4 City Council RDA members built in spite of the voters and they now want to spend more money on it.
One City Council RDA member listened to the voters and voted against the project.
This is the perfect example of why I call the RDA agencies a secret government over which we have no control.
The North Ogden RDA spent $6 million of sales tax revenue for 20 years on this pool and taxpayers had already told the Council they did not want a $3 million dollar pool paid for with property tax.
It is true that the Council members can be voted out but there will never be recourse for the $6 million of sales tax revenue they spent.
Besides the $6 million sales tax revenue they have illegally used Impact Fees from the General Fund on the pool.
The RDA statutes are unconstitutional and our legislators continue to ignore the dangers they create for Utah taxpayers.
May I be the first to commend the Standard Examiner editorial board for their right on editorial in this mornings newspaper. I think they hit the nail right on the head and captured what everybody has been saying and feeling here on this blog and around Ogden. Ya for them. I know you will more then likely highlight this piece accompanied by Grondahls masterpiece but I had to shout in excitment somewhere. YAAA! Ogden iii
Anon from 5:42. First of all, I am not a member of the Ogden City government. So there is a big difference between my using a phony name when posting on a blog and members of our city government refusing to release information because they think it will be controversial. Second, the name Publius was the one used by Madison, Hamilton, and Jay when they wrote letters to various newspapers back in 1787 and 1788 trying to convince New Yorkers to ratify the Constitution - otherwise known as "The Federalist." In fact, almost all of the letters written to newspapers during the debate over the Constitution were signed with fake names - Brutus, Cato, A Federal Farmer, and so on.
Dear Publius
I know my history.
They used these names so that the King of England would not hang them.
All of us are free to use our real names.
We are all cowards and are not comfortable to put our names on our thoughts.
ANON
Anon:
You wrote: "I know my history."
May be time for a refresher course. Hamilton, Madison and Jay wrote the Federalist Papers as "Publius" during the debate over the ratification of the US Constitution [1787-88]. The US had been an independent nation for a decade by then and they had nothing to fear from King George III's ire.
Calvin Grondahl's editorial cartoon this morning is priceless, and the accompanying editorial ain't half bad either.
I think we should all kick in a few bucks and have bumper stickers made up for him and the SE editors saying:
"HONK IF THE MAYOR IS
FOLLOWING MY CAR!"
Oh ya the Republicans are going to jump on signing those ethics pledges. Just after the Weber County Commissioners sign theirs.
I hear if you give them a $100.ooo dillar donation, they'll be sure to sign them. I'm so glad what we've elected. We should be so happy. Way to go republicans. Your so smart and funny, "ha ha''
Dear OZ BO
Most of the busnesses in Ogden are in favor of the vision of the Mayor. I can list dozens of very successful Ogden people who think him the best mayor Ogden has ever had. Two of them are Mel Kemp and John Lindquist.
As I wrote this e-mail, 2 men from California came to my office. They have bought buildings that are vacant on Washington Blvd and are restoring the old building and opening retail businesses in the bottom floor and putting condos on the upper floor.
They, without prompting, said that the Mayor and expecially Scott Brown, were instrumental in getting these projects started. They also said that the gondola project was what brought Ogden to their attention.
They were introduced to the mayor by Mike Dowse, the President of Amer. Who has brought 235 high paying jobs to Odgen. He has the hightest regard for the Mayor. (ASK HIM)
When I 1st moved back to Ogden, 2 years ago, I listened to you and Sharon Beech berating the Mayor for not saving the old buildings and not bringing retail and restaurants to downtown Ogden.
Over that past 2 years the Mayor and his admin have convinced dozens of investors and 13 ski brands to move to Ogden. They brought with them millions of dollars in salaries and these companies have all saved a historical Ogden building.
This Mayor and this Adminstration are hardly the villian and idiots you paint them to be.
Curt Geiger
Dear Mr. Geiger:
The problem is not what the Mayor has done well. Promoting Ogden as an out-door sports hub was a good idea and has worked well for the city. [I do note it's not the first grand "vision" the Mayor promoted for Ogden. When he first took office, the vision was Ogden as "the new Silicon Valley" and decisions about selling city property for development, and who not to sell to because they didn't fit the "new Silicon Valley" vision, were made that did not turn out well in the end.]
The problem is his welding a workable idea to the chimerical flatland gondola from downtown to WSU, financed by selling off the city's largest park and nearly only remaining public recreational openspace on the benches. A plan that will mortgage Ogden's financial future for a very long time to come if it fails. And we should note that the success of his development projects [High Adventure Rec Center, River Project], which has involved the investment of millions upon millions in public fund is still unproven. They may be great successes. I sincerely hope they will be. But the jury is not only still out, it hasn't been seated yet. Neither project is yet completed.
The argument that "the Mayor can't do anything right" is not sustainable on the evidence. But neither is the argument that "because he's had some success, his gondola/land sale scheme cannot fail" --- which at times is what you seem to be arguing.
And he has problems with the ethical conduct of his office. And has had for some time. Just by way of example [and to keep off the gondola and RDA matters for a moment], we saw that in his first term when he took to the air on Channel 17 to oppose a pending school bond vote [which was certainly his right as mayor], and then refused community groups supporting the school bond vote access to Channel 17 -- Ogden's COMMUNITY cable channel, paid for in part by taxpayers --- to make their case. Then there was the time he asked the Council to spring for expensive rollaway seating for the amphitheater. The Council [not this one, by the way, the former Council not noted for opposing Mayoral requests] said no, on grounds the city didn't have the money just then. He went ahead and bought them anyway.
That many business men and women [not all business men and women in Ogden, I can assure you] think the Mayor has done a good job promoting downtown business does not necessarily mean he has done, or will in the future do, a good job in the office overall. Not all of his plans have succeeded [remember Ogden "the new Silicon Valley"], and new proposals, particularly very expensive ones like the gondola/gondola and Peterson real estate speculation scheme, need to be vetted thoroughly, and their likelihood of success or failure carefully -- and publically -- examined. Note, please, that Envision Ogden, which seems to have been organized largely as a "Re-Elect Godfrey" group, has taken "no position" on the gondola/Peterson projects... or so its spokesperson informed the Standard Examiner.
Because the Mayor wants it, and some of his ideas have worked, and many downtown businessmen like him is not sufficient reason for me, or any active citizen, to abandon scrutiny of his actions in office [or the actions of any public official] and to simply fall obediently in line.
Dear Oz Bo
You remind me of the Chicken Little story.
The ski is not falling. Great things are happening. You can see the good if you look.
If you were more open minded, you could have been included in all of the discussions and have been a party to all of this good. You would have had some say in shaping the prosess.
I again, was just on the phone with the Mayors office before seeing your blog comments.
Another company is coming to Ogden to investigate. The Mayors office asked if I minded taking them to dinner one of the nights they will be here. (MORE GOOD)
The sky is blue Oz Boy. Your investments are going to increase in value. Our mountain is going to be cared for. Our public risk is going to be contractually protected.
Our buildings are going to be saved and our schools are going to have more money.
Curt Geiger
I, for one, will now prostrate myself in front of the "hub companies" and Little Matty Gondola Godfrey and pollute my britches with gratitude.
Curm,
Excellent post. Thank you.
You are right on using the word 'chimerical'....none of us disdain the new businesses coming to Ogden. None of us disdain the old buildings being preserved.
As you pointed out, we still disdain the unethical actions of the administration: the secrecy, unwillingness to communicate info to the RDA/Council, THEY should not oday or sign one thing the mayor urges 'right now'...that's his M.O>...but the RDA/Council must insist on anwers to the questions and when that info is not forthcoming, then they should just vote 'no'.
Of course, Godfrey must be removed as Exec Dir of the RDA.....we have so much chicanery from him and his A Team!
Now for whichever of you
anonymous' posters who complain about psuedonyms, I will sign my name.
Congrats to the SE today! Appreciate them letting the readers know about the 'secrecy' in our city gov't. Grondahl's cartoon is priceless! Kudos to them.
A few good things happening in Ogden will not suffice for the backroom deals, lies, disengenuous actions, and refusal to be open with the RDA/Council. So we must remain vigilant and aware of the
doings on the 9th floor.
And Curt, I still maintain that Chris, Godfrey, you and the Lift Ogdenites are hanging onto a non-proposal that is an unworkable chimera. REAL economic expansion by companies opening 'shop' here is welcomed. Just don't keep selling them the Big Lie that they can step out their door, hop onto the gondola with skiis, ride up to Malan's, ski, and return for a business meeting..all in one afternoon. (Did you measure the snowfall in Malan's this winter?) Or that one tenth of ten million cars will veer off I-15 just to ride the gondola!
One does wonder about the business acumen of those who swallow this fish story and decide to come here for THAT!
Along with flashlites that Jeske handed out to keep a lite on the admin's doings...we should take a look at your rods and reels. We already smell the bait you all use.
Dear Sharon Who
All of the companies that are coming here recognize that there is opposition to the gondola.
All of the companies meet with Chris Peterson and look at the plan.
All of the Presidents of the companies recognize there is risk that the negative factions of the community may prevail. They have people in there current home base that think like many of you.
All of them recognize that if the project is not successful that they can move.
There is absolutly "NO" disception with regard to talking to these companies. They are aware that "you" exist. They are comforted that "you" are a minority and one of a kind in this city.
Even the head of SLC Economic Developement is aware of this blog and the people who are on it. As he told me. "This blog and the negative people in Ogden are his greatist asset".
Curt Geiger
Hey Curt,
What do I have to do to get a look at the current version of "the plan"? If it's such a great idea, why all the secrecy?
hey curt,
which resturant are you going to take these clients to. Will it be the closed down j.b.'s on washington or harrison? how about the stage coach resturant? how about out to riverdale with all the resurants out there! or how about to resturant row in Layton? surely you would not want to go anywhere here in Ogden for fear that someone here will see you and then hear your plans to secretly do things to get the company the land that they will need, are you? Just where will you take them to dinner so that all of us here can meet these wonderful people and welcome them to Ogden!
Dear Dan
I assume you are Dan Schroeder from WSU.
You were invited to dozens of meetings. You are no longer in the loop because you are not objective you are only there to obstruct.
Curt Geiger
"You are no longer in the loop because you are not objective you are only there to obstruct."
It's the asme old arrogant theme you've been singing since you first hooked up with the little tyrant, and began to fall all over yourself with your misplaced sense of self-importance, ainnit Curt:
We're all invited to goose-step along like good little lemmings... so long as we don't have any ideas of our own.
BTW... Do you approve of the most recent outrage, wherein Dear Leader used his poitical position to deceptively obtain a sweetheart deal for your mutual political croney, Peterson?
Was it OK for Peterson to obtain option rights to the possibly most appreciating properties in Ogden (3 parcels adjacent to the Frontrunner station) without so much as an effort on the part of the administration to solicit or otherwise obtain competing offers? Several of our readers have privately communicated to us that they would have been interesting in bidding for those parvcels, yet the little tyrant chose to discriminate against all other potential buyers, and hand off these valuable property rights to your bestest buddy Chris.
Was the transaction OK for you?
"They are comforted that "you" are a minority and one of a kind in this city." - Curt Geiger to Sharon
Actually, Curt, if the turnout and opinions at the Mt. Ogden neighborhood meetings were an indication, you might rethink your definition of a minority. If those opposing the sale of the Golf Course and Urban Gondola are such a minority, why has Godfrey refused all suggestions of a public referrendum?
In fact, the Mayor's recent behavior (selling the Frontrunner-adjacent properties in secret) is a page taken from the Ellison-Cook emails about keeping the public out of the loop as much as possible. Isn't it? More stinkin' fish, I think.
Dear Ogden Lover
The reference to "you" was spacific to Sharon.
People can disagree about something and do so in a professional manner.
The woman that calls herself Sharon is only one of a kind.
Curt Geiger
Dear Mr. Geiger:
The argument you make begins to fall apart when you insist that people who think differently than you do, who question the cheerleading of the Lift Ogden Amen Chorus, be "cut out of the loop" [i.e. not kept informed or engaged in discussion] because they are "not objective." Well, when you eliminate all but true believers from discussion, from the process of policy formation, you end up both addressing and listening to an Amen Chorus of true believers who, by definition, will not ask questions, probe assumptions, challenge expectations. And formulating city policy that way, consulting only the already-converted, is not a wise model for any government to follow.
Two could play that game. I could rant about "the negative people in Lift Ogden who only oppose the trolley transit option that Ogden's Planning Commission has already approved, and that the Mayor's office has not sat on for two years. There's no need to consider the Nabobs of Negativism and their proposals. They're only out to obstruct." And so on.
We might have a more productive discussion of city affairs on all matters [not just involving the gondola] if you and your associates, including the Mayor, could get beyond dismissing any who dare to question, to disagree, to not stand and cheer on cue, as "negative" and "obstructionist." Doing that is simply a way to try to silence dissent, skepticism and disagreement. Not, please note, convert and convince by argument and evidence [precious little of which has been offered for either the downtown gondola or Peterson Proposal... what ever it might be at the moment, whatever version is current.] The goal seems only to silence those who question.
And that is not a wise model for a city government, any government, to adopt as a way to decide public policy.
I have a hard time believing that these posts signed by Curt Geiger are for real. Especially the ones telling me and Dan S. that we have been banned from the insiders club big boy's game because we won't drink the cool aide without question.
Seems like the Geiger's are way to bright to be throwing hangers like that, no?
But then again with the incredible hubris of the Godfreyites anything is possible.
Hey Geiger, since most if not all these ski related companies have in some monitary fashion(subsity) been inticed to come here,I find it not outside the possibilty they would as a thank you for such concideration, support one time, publicly,without specifics,the mayor's "vision." One can always change their mind. what's going to happen when they realize that Peterson is getting so much more, and it will ultimately be coming out of their pockets?
Dear Curm
No one in LIft Ogden, that I am aware of is against the Trolly system.
One other idea that was brought by SGO members was a Railroad Museum. No one in LO is against that. In fact it was proposed to 1 past Senator and 2 current senators when the Mayor and I were in Washington DC.
The problem was, from the mouth of the senators, that the ideas are good but likely many years away and Ogden cannot fund them or even a portion of them.
My idea of objectiveness is, "how do we do this without financial burden on the city taxpayers.
How do we do this and keep the neighborhoods on the east bench attractive and enjoyable? (All of the upper management of AMER plans to move there)
How do we do this and not visually scar the mountain?
How do we do this and maintain easy or improved access to the trails?
How do we do this, and should the golf course be involved, assure affordable public use?
How do we do this and create an asset for the University?
How do we write the contract with CP and protect the tax payers of Ogden?
If the answer is that there is no way any of this can be done, and we all agree.
How then, do we attract business to Ogden?
The Mayor and the Governor had traveled for 2 years trying to attract HI Tec to Ogden. Not one company showed any interest at all.
By chance, the gondola began to attract businesses and continues to attract attention. The owner of the Winery Private Club was in my office before noon today, He told me that he had been contacted by the Wall Street Journal regarding his position on the city and its plans. How long has it been since the WSJ gave a damn about Ogden.
If dinner with Oz Boy attracted business, I would be touting Oz Boy as the solution to our econonic problems. I would be trying to raize money to assist Oz Boy to increase the size of his dinning room.
The fact is, and only a fool will deny it, that the Mayors concept is helping to rebuild Ogden.
Curm, You are a very intellegent and decent person. I believe that you can help to revive Ogden if you would only offer. As far as I am concerned, you are welcome to sit at the table anytime that you wish.
Be aware that there are many tables discussing all of the projects that are happening in the city. The river project is underway with private money. The buildings in the city are being rebuild with private money.
The ski industry is meeting to create a Ogden City Ski Industry Board. The purpose of which is to promote a healthy life style in Ogden. Mike Dowse and Tom Berry addressed the concept of helping to GREEN OGDEN with Ann Milner last week.
Which table do you want to sit at? I will see that you are invited. It is up to you to be objective.
THE SKI IS A BEAUTIFUL BLUE.
Offer help!
Curt Geiger
Ohh, Jesus, I just puked all over my keyboard. How can we be more self-aggrandizing and nonsensical?
Boycott Descente products!
Make our local voices be heard.
Tell your local ski retailer you won't buy their foreign-made crap!
There are plenty of other ski apparel alternatives that don't support the Geigers.
Pass it on.
LOL, Curt! I was never in the loop and you know it.
(I was invited, by Producer Rupert, to one semi-private presentation by Peterson last April, about a week before his first big public presentation. That's when I heard him admit that his resort actually wouldn't be roadless--the roads just wouldn't be paved.)
Objective? Look, we all have our biases. The important thing is to report the facts accurately, rather than changing them to suit our purposes. My various attempts to report the facts are posted here. It's not a comprehensive picture, but I think it adds information to the debate, rather than just hot air. You, on the other hand, have added almost no verifiable facts to the debate. And you've also told some tall tales. I love that quote in Rupert's video: "Chris Peterson will build a gondola..." (emphasis added). Not might, not will, if the city agrees to sell him 175 acres of park land, but simply will. That's pretty funny, Curt, but not exactly "objective".
A very interesting view of what constitutes "objective." Objective seems to mean if you are in favor of "the project." This is the rant I often read in the paper and had delivered to my door last year when I was asked to take down the SGO sign in my yard. Let's all get behind "the project" and work together. I will remind the person who left that flier at my house that it said "now that SGOs questions are being answered." We're still waiting. As far as I know not a single question has been answered and no plan has been brought before WSU or the Ogden CC. Just trying to be objective here. Can't formulate an opinion until I see an actual proposal.
Before I read that I can't be objective if I have an SGO sign in my yard, I will add that my SGO sign says: "Ask questions." One in particular that I need answered before I can develop an opinion is whether a road will be built from Ogden to Malan's Basin in order to build and maintain a resort in the Basin. Telling me that CP is looking at the possibility of building the resort without using a road is not an answer. When he knows for sure if he can do it, then I'll have a key bit of info with which to formulate an opinion.
To Curt,
You mentioned in your post today at 11:13 am and I quote you “All of the companies meet with Chris Peterson and look at the plan.”, and your suggestion by this comment being that they all support the project.
Please tell me why if he really has a plan, (especially one that is detailed enough with financials for an astute business leader to be comfortable enough with the plans to endorse the project) has he or the city not brought those endorsements forward or for that matter why hasn’t he presented that information to the city council that waited for over 6 months for just that type of information?
I suspect that Curt you’re just being a salesman again. Sticks to selling something that you know something about, winter leisure suits!
Dear Dan
I did not write the copy or produce the video that you mention.
1. Fact. There are 13 ski brands in Ogden.
2. Fact. There are over $22M in salaries brought to Ogden via the ski industry
3. Fact. Buildings are being purchased and renovated in the city due to the ski industry coming here.
4. Fact. The ski industry is moving to Ogden in hopes that a gondola will be built.
5. Fact. Other investors are renovating buildings because of the percieved changes in the city brought by the gondola proposal
6. Fact. The meeting that the Mayor held were public meetings.
7. Fact. Chris Peterson held several public meetings.
8. Fact. You could have attended any of those meetings.
9. Fact. Many Ogden citizens that did attend the meetings and wanted to be part of the planning are indeed part of the planning.
10. Fact. Chris Peterson asked at every meeting what was important to the people in the room.
11. Fact. Chris Peterson says that he is addressing most all of the suggestions that were presented to him.
12. Fact. THERE IS NO FINAL PROPOSAL YET MADE PUBLIC
13. Fact. You will again be asked for comment when they do become public.
14 Fact. Chris Peterson did not say there "would" be roads. He said that there may have to be roads. He preferred to do the work without them however.
15. Fact. The land is Chris Petersons land.
These statements are not objective. Objectivity is not necessary when facts are present.
Curt Geiger
FYI, Curt. Facts are the essence of objectivity.
Great idea, Long Time Skiier!
We're linking below an image of our one and only Descente-manufactured Ski Suit...
Which we put to the fire in out back-yard only moments ago!
We also recommend all local skiers burn their Descente gear.
15. Fact. The land Chris Peterson and his squirrel patrol are seeking to steal in order to build your silly-ass urban gondola-to-nowhere is the public's.
THE FORK IS BEAUTIFUL SILVER.
"Objectivity is not necessary when facts are present."
???????
The Geiger piece is precious! Change the setting and a few of the words and phrases and you could have "Bagdad Bob" just before the fall! Very dillusional thinking for sure.
I think Mr. Geiger may have a surprise in store this November. One that will put his claims of Mayor Godfrey being beloved by the public to rest once and for all.
If you took each of his bragging points individually and dissected them you would find much of the same stuff. Deception and misdirection being chief amongst them. At the heart of every claimed success is some one who has been trampled upon, or a truth that has been abused. And all of it has been done with public money and without the public's approval, and most often in secret combinations outside of public view. Some success!
Regardless of how welcome these small ski companies are, they are not the panacea for all that ails Ogden. All of them together do not register on the top ten employers in Ogden. The Amer sport company is clearly coming to Utah because of the $12 million in incentives the STATE is giving them. Their choice of Ogden was reported to be incidental and having little to do with the mayor or the Geigers. Of course the presidents of these companies are going to tell the mayor good things. They are not idiots. What possible good would it do them to be enemies with the mayor? They will also say good things about the next mayor as well. These endorsements from these new companies - large and small are for the most part meaningless.
If Mr. Geiger and the Mayor would honestly pursue things as he outlined, and honestly appraise things as he insinuates, then there would not be a problem. However, their past actions do not indicate that they do what they say. They do not appear to be truly interested in the high flown retoric like that which Mr. Geiger put forth herein a couple of posts back. They do not ever consider anything beyond their own fantasies that center around their own greatness. No ideas but their own are invited to their "A" table.
I for one find them to be arrogant and very self important. They are unable to conceal the distain that they have for the people of Ogden.
Dear Marion
There was not one thing that you said that was true!
Curt Geiger
Thanks for posting here, Curt.
Everybone's getting a real good picture of how thoroughly unravelled you've become!
Post here often!
Never leave this place!
I'm MELTING!!!!!!
Curt Geiger
Curt Geiger,
Your sales pitch has a little different touch to it than it used to have. Used to be that Ogden needed more jobs until someone pointed out the ever growing number of want ads in the paper for jobs and not just low paying jobs.
Now your pitch is that we need more business’ in town and you have the people to do it. You’re bringing in all these people from outside the community (and a few greedy ones within the community) and setting them up to make a killing at the expense of the residents.
Seems to me the secret society that you’re talking about (disturbingly with the help of our mayor and his whole administration) is dividing up the city by sections and deciding who get to buy into what sections, with the RDA acting as the buying and selling agent in most cases to ensure that the just the RIGHT PEOPLE be included. By your own admission there are meeting that you have to be invited to and while there you get to sit at tables that talk about all of the projects that the city is trying to develop.
“Be aware that there are many tables discussing all of the projects that are happening in the city. The river project is underway with private money. The buildings in the city are being rebuild with private money.”
I’ll be willing to bet that the mayor and/or some of his staff are at those meeting offering bits and pieces of our city to those lucky few but as you indicated you must be invited to be able to attend.
Where is the public process in all of this and when the decisions as to who gets to buy what, where is the rest of the city government (i.e. the city council) and where is the rest of the community? Where is the openess?
Private money used to buy property that a lot of times was originally bought with city money siphoned off by the RDA or in some cases with money directly out of the city’s general fund!
This wholesale raping of the city coffers for the benefit of the Friends of Matt is despicable and your flag waving effort to insinuate that you all are doing this for our own good is flat insulting.
How do you look yourself in the mirror?
Does anyone know?
Are those three parcels of land that Mr. Peterson bought each one acre apiece? If so, with the sales price of the whole transaction $270,000, that would mean that each acre sold for only $90,000. That would be about 1/3 of the price that the city is considering selling the Shupe-Williams property for which is only about an acre. If this is the case, this would be a clear indication that the city did not get a fair market price for the property (especially since this should be more valuable than the other property) and considering that we don’t even know what the use or timing of that use would be, it would also rule out the consideration that the discount was warranted by the intended use of that property.
If someone could determine this, it could be very interesting.
Curt
4. Fact. The ski industry is moving to Ogden in hopes that a gondola will be built.
Those ski industry folks should get out a little and ski and learn a little about ski areas and what makes them great, if they think a gondola to Malan's is real.
1. Acreage...more the better, almost 3000 at Snowbasin, over 5000 at Powder. How in your mind does 280 acres in Malan's seem impressive to a SKI COMPANY? Because you LIE to them and tell them it's bigger. Even with Strongs it's under 500. You're too much Curt.
2. Snow quality and quantity. If you got out and skied now and then you would know something about snow quality instead of snow garb. Notice what happens at Snowbasin when just a hint of sun peeks through. The snow turns to shit. You must like this snot. I don't, and any self respecting powder hound knows the goods are on the northern exposures. You need a powder lesson, my good man.
3. Accessibility...riding a gondola across town for an hour plus to NOT get to Snowbasin is not a definition of accessibility
FACT...Ogden is a great ski town WITHOUT a friggin stupid gondola to an undersized unbuilt ski area paid for by selling our public open space. I think you will find people in the ski industry to be a little smarter and they can figure out the real facts given time. I did. I pity the ill-informed. It's so embarrassing when you discover you have been had by a bunch of part-time and non skiers.
Curt, you missed some incredible powder the last couple of days. Better get out of the well-bent office chair.
Sheez....armchair athletes. All talk.
Do not confuse me with the facts.
My mind is made up.
Curt Geiger
LOL
Rudi, your suit is smudging up the neighborhood.
Thank goodness I never owned a ski suit, especially Descente.
Fortunately snowboarding came along before I sullied my steez on skis. Skiing is so 80's.
Has Dan S been invited to the Ogden City Ski table?
Has he been invited to sit on the board of the GREEN OGDEN table?
What's the matter, Curt? Have you missed seeing me at the CC meetings recently? You and your bud, Ed Allen seem to have an obsession with insulting me and are in rage that I don't share the little mayor's visions. Thank heaven Ed has finally stopped writing letters to me extolling his son-in-law's 'virtues'.
Now you seem to have come out of your coma. The night your mouthy son insulted me and invited me to slap his face and I accommodated him...you never blinked! It was like you were in a another zone! Even when the bratty kid screamed for all to hear on 3 floors..."I am NOT a kid...I'm 30 years old!"...you didn't react. You finally told the cop to tell the kid that his BOSS said to cool it.
What is it now....is the kid out of control ...and YOU want to antagonize me into slapping him again?
I find it amusing that you started a rant against ME in your postings today. Interesting that 'even the SLC Economic Development' folks know Sharon Beech...do you take them to lunch and have nothing better to talk about than me?
You and your fellow visionaries imbue me with power! From your silly posts it appears that ALL of us who are concerned and against the LO machinations are POWERFUL...we can all be known to the SLC folks! Imagine that.
POWER TO THE ASKERS AND THINKERS!!!
You sheople still don't get it.
You elected us to be your leaders.
We are the Shepherds and you are the sheep.
That's how it is in a Republic.
Dang! I keep forgetting that this is Mexico.
Cuba? Venezuela? Where am I?
So Gore was given an Oscar by his lefy non-thinking 'friends' in Hollyweird.
So what? The news reported that his BIG abode costs $1300. a month for electricity...and $1000. a month for gas.
Yep...and those private planes he flies in to all his meetings with other non-thinkers pollute our atmosphere BIG TIME!
Hypocrisy....a requirement for being a leftist non-thinking sycophant, whether in Ogden administration or on the leftist national political scene.
Maybe Godfrey will be awarded part of an Oscar...eg...the finger?
Dear Mr. Geiger:
Asking for a dialog, for input from people just so long as they don’t disagree with the ends you seek isn’t very helpful. Neither is fudging issues with language. Let me give you an example. You wrote: “No one in Lift Ogden, that I am aware of is against the Trolley system.” Nice try, but that’s not the question. Hell, I’m a big fan of gondolas. Ride ‘em all the time. At Snow Basin. At Snowbird. Even the tram in Albuquerque. Big fan of gondolas... in places where it makes good sense to build them, which is connecting lower elevation base stations with higher elevation terminals across difficult terrain. It’s the flatland gondola from downtown to WSU that makes no sense to me. Saying LO folks are for “a trolley system” fudges the issue, which is not “a trolley system” in general. It’s the trolley line identified by the Wasatch Front Regional Council as the one most likely to succeed as a transit route, from downtown to WSU and McKay-Dee Hospital via Harrison. That one. The one that the Ogden City Planning Commission endorsed nearly two years ago now. And which the Mayor has sat on because acting on it would have interfered with his attempts to sell the downtown gondola over the same route as a better transit option. Saying the Mayor and LO are for trolleys here, trolleys there, trolleys almost anywhere except over the route the WFRC says is the one for which it is most needed and most likely to succeed really is dodging the question.
As I’ve said now many times, in many places, if Mr. Peterson wants to build a gondola [with his financing] from the head of 36th Street to Malan’s Basin, and needs a small [say five acres] parcel of city land for a base station, I’d support the city working with him on that. So long as it did not involve sale of the Mt. Ogden parklands and burdening the city with the multi-million dollar construction bill and operating costs for a flatland gondola from downtown that seems likely to fail. That’s the issue, not trolley systems in general or gondolas in places where they make sense. And so far, no one I’ve seen has seen any feasibility studies that indicate a flatland gondola would or could succeed, or that the entire broader project, generally called the “Peterson Proposal” which apparently many businessmen have seen but the public, the planning commission, and the city council have not — or at least not in its present incarnation, could. For a supposed “public project,” an awful lot of it seems to be going on in secret. And I have not forgotten Mr. Ellison’s note to Mr. Cook expressing a desire that as much as possible happen without public scrutiny.
Let’s agree on some basics: we all want Ogden to be prosperous. We all want more and better paying jobs to come to Ogden. We all would like an increased tax base. We all want a better quality of life for Ogden’s citizens. The problem is, many of us not only don’t think the highly speculative gondola/gondola Peterson real estate speculation scheme will achieve that, we think it stands a good chance of undermining and perhaps crippling what Ogden already has and the good things the Mayor has done [outdoor sports hub idea] and the projects underway that are not yet proven [High Adventure Center, River project].
One thing I can say for my side in this disagreement, pretty much the SGO side, is that it has done a far better job so far of providing evidence [fact, illustration, example, studies, etc] to support its views and proposals than your side [pretty much the LO side] has done providing evidence [fact, illustration, example, studies] in supporting yours. And SGO and other groups, like the Sierra Club, have posted their information, studies, etc on websites available for all to peruse, attack, confirm, comment on, refute or suggest amendments to.
Thanks for the invitation to help out, but I’m already involved in several community organizations aimed at improving life in the city. In fact, just this week spent some hours meeting with a city staffer the Mayor has tasked to collect information, suggestions, feedback about improving the trails network in and around Ogden, [By the way, getting feedback in advance from various community groups as an overall trails improvement policy is put together is a good idea. See? I can credit the Mayor when he has a good idea. That was one.] Many many others not supporting the gondola/gondola proposal work with city officials, panels and committees on a variety of civic improvement matters all the time. Many others, donating hundreds of hours of their time and, in some cases [not mine], their expertise as well. Have to tell you, one of the things that annoys people on the other side of the gondola/gondola matter is the frequent implication by gondola/gondola supporters that it is only those who agree with you and Mr. Peterson and the Mayor who are working to improve Ogden. Signing on to the Lift Ogden agenda is not the only option out there for people who have Ogden’s improvement, and growth, in mind and are willing to donate time to help achieve both.
I’m glad you’ve been posting here again [and no sarcasm intended]. And I’m glad you’re continuing to be involved in attracting outdoors-oriented businesses to Ogden. If you want to engage on the substance of the issues, weigh in. I doubt we’re going to end up agreeing on a whole lot, but who knows? Maybe we’ll find some common ground and maybe there are solutions for Ogden’s problems that will emerge... or at least for some of them... on which we can agree and work for a common end.
Thanks for the reply. Sorry it took so long to answer, but work got in the way. [ I know, I know, I let work interfere with blogging. I have got to get my priorities in order......]
Open Letter to the Forum,
I been very fortunate in my life to have traveled quite a bit, observed quite a bit, been involved in quite a bit and have been in business long enough to realize that when an area of the country or a community start to grow, that a lot of times its not because of any extraordinary action by the local officials but a lot of times its because of other dynamics at work. There is a lot in life to be said for being in the right place at the right time.
An example of this is a friend of mine who’s parents have lived in Jackson Hole for 45 years (his father was a school teacher), their property today is be worth untold multiples of what they paid for it and yet they had very little to do with that.
Ogden has sat here fairly stagnant from a economic growth stand point for twenty five plus years, not that I particularly think that was or is necessarily bad, but the reasons for that are somewhat a reaction to actions taken by the community but more likely by actions within a bigger context than just the community.
The point that I’m driving at is that Ogden is starting to see resurgence in business activity and an increased interest in it by the business community as a whole. There are a lot of reasons for this new found interest in Ogden that we need to understand and we also need to understand that a lot of the reasons are for reasons outside of what Ogden is or is not doing.
First, Ogden has in the past been ignored because of a bad reputation as a rough blue collar town which was probably true. One simply has to look at our past major industries in town to realize the root and cause of that reputation, the railroad. That perception has weighted heavy on the city’s real estate value in relationship to other growing communities that surround us. That in turn has caused people that have less to spend to gravitate toward the city because of it affordability. Today central Ogden is approximately 85% rental property. I firmly believe that this is Ogden’s biggest challenge; that of turning around this part of our community and where Ogden will reap its biggest benefit.
Fortunately we as a community are on the verge of being at the right place at the right time and not because of anything that we’ve done or are about to do.
Just for the same the reasons that my friend’s parents could not have anticipated their fortunate turn of events in Jackson Hole, neither could anyone really anticipate the reasons why today that Ogden is starting to boom. Just as water seeks out the lowest point on a floor so do real estate investors when they see an undervalued market, particularly when that market is surrounded by valuable property on all sides and because the starting point is much lower than the rest of the surrounding real estate values the percentage moves in absolute value should be quite impressive.
Ogden is further blessed in the resurgence in the desirability of urban living that is taking off all over the country. One has just to go to SLC and look at all of the Loft developments taking place there in the downtown part of the city to see this trend. Denver is another example that comes to mind. With regards to Ogden we have all the same making that developers find attractive in these other cities plus the city is about to get the added boost of the Frontrunner rail service. Combine this with the proximity to the activities that surround Ogden and we are a diamond in the rough that just been discovered. Ogden is truly on the verge of a major boom. This will not only benefit the downtown area of the city but should carry over to the central part of the city’s residential neighborhood as more and more see the value of proximity to the urban lifestyle.
The reason for my comments are two fold, first, that contrary to some of the comments of certain parties that we need their presence to make Ogden flourish, I counter that they are simply seeing what I and other investors are seeing and are trying to grab up as much as they can before the rest of you see what’s going on. As they say the early bird gets the worm.
Secondly we have an administration that is neither worldly enough, experienced enough nor been around long enough to understand what’s really going on here. They are still of the mind set that we have to lure people to Ogden and are giving away the store to get people in the door when they really, really don’t have to. As I said, there is a lot in life to be said for being in the right place at the right time.
These last two posts are two of the best posts I have read here.
Curm, you are the man
Anonymous, whoever you are, I have been trying to put that exact thought into words recently, thank you. I, too, am invested in Ogden for all the right reasons, not for some gondolist dreams. It is the market that is coming to Ogden and Godfrey simply finds himself at the right place at the right time. Hopefully he doesn't get in the way of the wave.
Oh yeah,
8 more inches expected tonight in the mountains.
Curt and Bobby,
I'll be at the front of the gondola line in the A.M. if there's more than 5". Be there or be lame.
Tell ya what, we mark out on a map of Snowbasin about 280 acres, roughly the size of Malan's Basin. You are confined to ski there only while I venture around the whole 2800 acres. Bring your clientele. Have fun suckers!!!!
Anon 9:56
Nicely said.
Someone who claimed to be Curt Geiger said:
2. Fact. There are over $22M in salaries brought to Ogden via the ski industry
On the other hand, Weber State University has a payroll of over $100 million. What has Mayor Godfrey done for WSU lately?
I might add that at least I can provide sources for my information. You cannot, and do not. If you were one of my students, I'd give you an "F" for that alone.
I was at the public meetings you reference in your post. I saw no desire on Mr. Peterson's or Mayor Godfrey's part to hear what I, and many other members of the public, had to say. In fact, the meetings I attended were sales presentations. My clear impression was that the so-called Peterson Plan was a fait accompli, not a suggestion or idea.
Ogden City continues to neglect the biggest employer opportunity in the state.
We should be courting its workers because its not just the biggest employer in the state, its one of the highest paying employers in the state. It Hill AFB and its about to have almost a 50% turnover in its labor force due to retirements. A lot of those people that will be replacing those retirees will be move here from other places or some will be area locals looking to move up in their lifestyle.
Why aren't we developing a plan to capture some of these potential new Ogden residents attention? They may not be as flashy as ski bums but their check are sure cashable and their a whole lot less transient.
Get rid of Hill Field Air Force Base. Its big government.
Dear Ano
The city of Ogden has a plan to get the new employees at HILL to move into the city.
It is the internal revitalization that most all of you are trashing.
If the inner city is not revitalized then the HILL employees will buy homes elsewhere just as most of them currently do.
Abother ANO
Ya let's do away with Cops, Teachers, Firefighters, Garbagemen, and Roads too. Its big government.
Ya I hate big government too. Ya we don't need cops, teachers or firemen. Can I get the government contract. Those employees don't need vacation or sick pay or medical benifits. I'll get Illegals to do it for $5.50 an hour.
Republican; You may as well do away with the public employees. Most of them are republicans anyway.
Another ANO 8:08
What the hell are you talking about. No one here on WCF is against inner city revitalization. In fact we have tossed around a ton of ideas that address that issue directly. Get you head and facts straight fool.
I own inner city property and am appalled at how the CENTRAL city is ignored. I am taliking about the residential core that has it's center at 24th and Monroe. Redeveloping that corner could have more effect on inner city revitalization than any single city sponsored project...yet it sits largely empty subsisting as a ghetto corner with rundown drug and convenience store. The city does nothing and scares away the owner who was looking for support for its redevelopment plans.
Raising property values in this Central City Core would offset the irrational need to seek tax base by selling the golf course and developing second homes.
Get real dude.
Another ANO,
If Hill employees had any sense they would be buying right now ...today before any initiatives that will undoubtedly raise values.
You too, fool.
Have you invested in our city. If everyone of you big talkers out there just bought one rundown home and got your hands dirty remodeling it you would see more effect than any government initiatives. That's private enterprise and community pride working.
So would please locate for me a single post here on WCF that reveals any one of the partipants as Anti-Inner City Revitalization...
See this is another example of those who liten to the mayor characterize anyone who is against any of his ideas as naysayers and ill-informed. A sick pathological mind with like followers.
Dear Anon
Open Letter responce;
You may think that this is all just happening because it is "our turn".
The fact is that it is the gondola project that is bringing attention to the city.
Ask Curt Geiger why Descente allowed him came here.
Ask Mike Dowse why AMER came here.
Ask Tom Berry why Salomom came here.
Ask Jack Baltz why Atomic came here.
Ask Gadi Leshem why Cover All came here.
Ask Dave Coobly why he came and is investing millions to rebuild the empty buildings.
Ash Stuart Sheldon why he came here and is referbishing buildings.
Ask Scott Beck, CEO of SLC Tourism what affect the gondola is having on his attempts to bring tours and business to SLC.
Ask Micheal Nelson form the Governors office, what is changing Ogden
Ask Scott Parkinson from the Bank of Utah what is bringing people here.
Ask Mel Kemp what is bringing people here.
Ask Scott Nichol owner if IBIS Bikes why he is here and investing in Ogden.
Ask Andy Peay owner of Peay Vinyards why he is here and investing in Ogden.
Call the board of realtors and ask them why the sudden upsurge in interest in Ogden.
Call Wolf Creek Resort and ask them what the Mayors vision is doing for their project.
Ask Jeff Hyde why he bought a empty building in Ogden and is remodeling it.
Ask Dan Tabbish how inportant the Mayors project is the the investors in the Hotel Ben Lomond.
Ask the management of the convention center if the Gondola is important to their success. Ask them if the have promisses from convention groups to come to Ogden if the gondola goes in. (SSL & SMC)
Ask the management of the Egyptian Theatre if the Gondola is important to them.
Ask Mitch at the Winery if the Mayors vision is important to him.
Ask Shane Baldwin, of Merrill Lynch, if he thinks that the Gondola will bring economic revival to the city. Ask them if ML Coorporate was asking them to move from Ogden. The Mayors plans convinced their coorporate office to stay.
Ask Coach McBride if the gondola will help him in recruiting.
Ask Bill Marolt, the President of the US Ski Team what he thinks will happen to Ogden and WSU if this gondola goes in.
Ask Dorreen Jeske if the Mayors plan is changing Ogden?
Ask John E. Lindquist if the Mayors vision is changing Ogden.
Ask Dave Hardman, President of the Ogden City Chamber of Commerse, if the Gondola and the plan of the Mayor is changing the business climate in Ogden
Ask Rupert Hitzig what brought him here?
Ask Questions-Get answers
I understand that you want to think that the Mayors plan has nothing to do with the surge in investment and jobs however, you are dead wrong.
Curt Geiger
Regarding HB233, the bill that would have forced cities to let people build on the bench, it appears it was defeated. I hadn't heard that before. If it is true it is great news.
Bill Status
Last Action: 28 February 2007, House/ enacting clause struck
Last Location: House file for defeated bills
Bill Status Last Updated: 1 March 2007, 1:55 AM
Curt,
All of those companies came here for the bottom line and nothing else. Godfrey's vision was just icing and none of the wigs you mention have the slightest idea whether an urban gondola is a good idea and feasible.
You're off the hook Curt, only 4" reported at Snowbasin. You're excused from any assumption of not being a hard-core skier. I'm headed up soon, though, as the storm approaches and the Needles cam shows little vis. Care to take a few runs? ride a gondola or three.
Again as has been stated by Curm and more,
all of the poster at WCF want good for ogden and support the ski-hub concept. it is the urban gondola, golf course sale crap that has us wretching.
quit retreating to your same old naysayer line. You assume because they came here on the hint of an urban gondola that an urban gondola is a good idea. That is some bass-ackwards logic if I ever heard any.
LOL! Looks like old Curt drank a whole pot of coffee this morning!
Curt you did not even address the anonymous open letter. You just spewed latte all over your shirt and the same old naysayer phlegm over too many lines of this page.
Ask Curt Geiger if he has reached the level of Ricky Henderson-esque prominence necessary to refer to himself in the third person.
Ask Curt Geiger if he knows name dropping is an acute sign of insecurity, inflated self-worth, self-delusion and arrogance.
"Ask the management of the Egyptian Theatre if the Gondola is important to them."
What a stupid statement. There is no gondola so how could it be important to them. If they are betting the success of their biz on the IDEA of something that even if proven feasible and approved is more than 10 years away(20 in reality as the urban gondola would be the last component in the plan for installation)Then they have some pretty weak business plans. The Egyptian theather was here long before any gondola plans. It'll do fine regardless.
Gondolas does interest Curt Geiger.
It really do.
Curt Geiger
It seems a little peculiar that after publicly down playing the gondola idea locally,as well as laying low, even Godrey was quoted once in the Tribune as saying he's exploring not including the Golf Course, here comes Geiger firing up the Gondola hype again. Is all this just hype, a way to gain attention, like a childs temper tantrum? We know that tactic works on some parents, maybe it works in the currently sagging national realestate world.Wasn't it just a week or two past that Godfrey's new praise chorus told the paper they have no position on the gondola?
I don't know about some of the people on Mr. Geiger's "Ask" list, but let me take a shot at re-phrasing a few of the questions to fit current reality in Ogden:
The "Ask Curt Geiger" seems pretty disingenuous for starters. Isn't he the rag hustler from Ogden that hired on with Descente a few years ago in Denver and talked them into letting him go back home because their operation wasn't that big any way and they could save money on rents and salaries in Ogden vs Denver? Then when he got here he buddied up with the kindred spirit mayor and started this whole Gondola Scam in the first place? Now he is implying the Gondola is the reason he came? Cheeky devil aint he?
Amer. is coming here because of the $12 million Governor Huntsman dangled in front of their face and because the Wasatch mountains beat the Cascades for their product lines.
Salomon is part of Amer - no?
Atomic also part of Amer? Making the last two "askes" misleading.
Ask Gadi Leshem if he needed a place to put the money he alledgedly stole from the State of California.
Ask Dave Coobly if he is a smart guy that sees a lot of forces that make for a good bet. Ask if he's too smart to roll millions on one off the wall scheme that may or may not happen and which he has no control over.
Ask same of Stuart Sheldon.
Ask any number of people in the Governor's office what a pompous impossible jerk our mayor is.
Ask Mel Kemp how he got a free $2.5 million out of the RDA on a highly questionable deal.
Ask the management of the convention center why they continually lose money.
Ask Mitch Moyes if the mayors vision is important to him.
Ask Coach McBride if the gondola will help him be less of a losing baffoon.
Ask Dorreen Jeske if the mayor and the geigers have an integrity problem with how they conduct themselves.
Ask John E. Lindquist if he is going to find a different horse to ride this November.
Ask Rupert Hitzig how far up Gadi's butt he can go and still see daylight.
Ask rhetorical questions-Get answers you like.
"Ask Tom Berry why Salomom came here."
Curt,
Sporting Goods Business asked Tom Berry that exact question...
“SGB: Why is Salomon USA relocating to Ogden, UT??
Tom Berry: The Mountain is the single most important reason we chose
Ogden. From Main Street, you look up to some of the best skiing in the
world. Ogden has significant resources for all mountain sports:
hiking, snowboarding, alpine and nordic skiing, kayaking, climbing and
mountain biking. That authenticity, plus the affordability and
infrastructure required to run a mid-sized business as well as access
to a major airport, clinched the decision. Ogden is somewhat
comparable to Boulder 30 years ago, the difference being Ogden’s
proximity to world class skiing. It’s affordable, has a major airport,
a great level of infrastructure and is only 45 minutes from Salt Lake.
It has everything a mid-sized, $100 million business needs.
It is very cost effective in Utah, we’ll be able to attract and
maintain employees who want to live in a mountain town. It’s a
university town with diverse business. The team in Utah has the goal
of transforming Ogden into a leader in the high-adventure recreation
business, a hub for the industry and participants. We want to create
an environment where experts want to be.”
I tried, but I could not find "gondola" as any reason to locate hear. Sounds to me like he saw that all the resources were in place and they came.
Curt,
Sorry about the delayed reply. Somehow I found better things to do last night than to read your list of 15 "facts". Some others have already responded pretty well. I would only add a few points:
1. The voice in the video that claimed that "Chris Peterson will build a gondola" sure sounded a lot like yours.
2. Vague statements that contain a grain of truth aren't the same thing as facts. Your number 4 falls into this category.
3. I sat through the Peterson/Godfrey sales pitch at least six separate times last April, May, and June, plus once the preceding September, and once the June before that when you delivered the pitch personally in the course of hijacking our transit meeting. What I want to know now is, What's changed? Are there any actual draft plans for the project? Are there any specific ideas for solving all the topographic and infrastructure challenges? Are there any feasibility studies? If this is to be a publicly subsidized project, then the public oughta get to see the plans as they develop.
4. As others have pointed out, the project as proposed last spring included use of a heck of a lot of public land. Besides the city and university property in the foothills, there'd be impacts to Forest Service roadless areas where the proposed 15-foot-wide "trails" that are really unpaved access roads would be constructed.
5. Fact: Along the alignment of the Portland streetcar there has been over 2.3 billion dollars of economic investment since the alignment was identified a decade ago. Yes, that's billion with a B. The investments generated by general-purpose, robust, modern transit systems are well documented nationwide and are enormous compared to the amount of investment you're attributing to the proposed gondola. And it seems just a little bit likely that the coming arrival of the FrontRunner has a lot more to do with these investments than any speculative future projects.
Curt,
Wear steel-toed boots when dropping all those names!
BTW Republican.8:05 am...can't you think up your own moniker??? Must be a democrat!
Rumor has it that 30% of the approximate 15,000 employees at Hill AFB will be eligible for retirement within the next 5 years. That means about 4,500 new employees within the next 5 to 6 years.
Seems to me that’s a whole lot more than the 1200 (mostly minimum wage jobs) that the mayor of Ogden is talking about coming about from all of his efforts to convince ski companies to come here, using our city money as an inducement for their coming here.
Why don’t we just try to convince those new hires to move to Ogden? Why doesn’t the mayor spend our money cleaning up the city and making Ogden’s central residential neighborhood’s a safer place to live rather than spending our money on his pie in the ski business development ideas? Think of how much more money the city would have in its budget if all of the home in the central district of Ogden were worth three times as much as they are today and they were owner occupied as opposed to being rental property.
Seems to me that if we want to attract anyone ski company employees, Hill AFB employees, or anyone for that matter, we need to put more effort into making Ogden a better place to live. I, myself, am less concerned about shopping options than I am about ensuring the safety of my family and maintaining the quality of life that we have here in Ogden. If we don’t address this area of the city and address this issue the people will just live somewhere else and commute to Ogden and that goes for ski company employees, Hill AFB employees or whoever.
Open Letter to the Forum
A well known business saying in the world economic circles is that if the United States gets a runny nose, the rest of the world catches a cold. The meaning of that saying is that the U.S. is the market place for the world and if we stop buying, the whole rest of the world looses their market and thus the rest of the world is in financial trouble. The rest of the world needs us to be healthy and for the U.S. to be buyers.
The point here is that the consumer is the driver of business not the other way around. The buyers are what bring the business to a location. If Ogden has buyers then businesses will come, it’s that simple.
Ogden City government needs to realize this basic premise and stop thinking the other way around, that the only way to improve Ogden is to bring in new businesses. You can move the most desirable companies into any area but if the areas surrounding that area are trashy and unsafe, the businesses will either fold or relocate. That’s because the residents in the immediate surrounding areas either cannot afford the products or do not value the services being offered while those that can afford those services or products that come from other areas do not feel comfortable in the surroundings where those businesses are located. Why do you think that Ogden’s downtown is where it’s at today?
The mayor is trying to solve Ogden’s problem using one of the most expensive method that there is, that of tearing everything down and starting all over again. His lack of patience to prove up even his first success is a sign of overconfidence and/or immaturity when it comes to doing business. Seldom do projects that involve such an extensive endeavor relative to the community size come together as originally envisioned and by not allowing himself (and the city) any time to learn what is or is not working within his master plan, he is surely adding cost to the project and risk to its success.
I would suggest that before the city takes on any more projects that it would at least completes the ones that it has already started, that of The Junction and The River Project. I would also suggest that all additional efforts by the city be directed toward improving the standards of living in the existing neighborhood that surround these projects. These two projects are meant to be pedestrian friendly and if they are to reach their intended potential they will only do so with the contributions and patronage of those people that live within walking distance of them. As such an effort should be made to improve the desirability of living in those areas that surround these projects.
Business development can only do so many things. Ogden City needs to now focus its efforts on improving the standard of living within the older residential neighborhood communities that surround our city. Let me drive home that point one more time, the consumer is the driver of business not the other way around.
Well, you'll never be on the mayor's A team!
I have been watching this blog with some interest ... not as good as
"24", but still interesting. I am recording it all, and think it will be my next mini series. 'OGDEN CITY"
When one thinks about what is happening in the world, and how we all fit in to a master plan, I sit back in wonder and see this blog ... intelligent people ... name calling, spiteful, wasting net space, confused, not interested in progress, even though you have allowed your town to disintegrate without any effort for change on your part ... just name calling, spiteful, disgusting attacks on people's places of business, and I wonder.
Oh yes, I wonder, at why and how our Republic is breaking down on account of division like yours.
Most of you don't even spell your rants correctly, you are so excited ... most of you have lost the big picture for the small petty in-town bickering over what? An idea for change? ... an idea for making the stinking river you have had custody of for so many years and have allowed to crumble in the waste of your own fellow citizens ... a design to make it better.
How dare you use words to attack a person's livelihood when you are only discussing issues, trading ideas ... how dare you convict a person before he is judged by the Courts ... a man who is not guilty of any greater sin than trying to contribute to your growth ... and how dare you, Sharon, tell me that when "the lights go on, the cockroaches scurry to the dark", or Lionel, that I have "my head up someone's arse and can't see the daylight".
The discussion on this blog is unproductive, and ugly, and most of you should hide your "blog fingers in shame ..."
This in NOT what the net was intended for ... you have taken a productive tool, and turned it into a spiteful, propagandistic and negative addition to your small town mentalities.
Curt Geiger is a wonderful person. His company is a great addition to your town. Bob is energetic, and a man who came back to raise his children in Ogden. A Marine Captain who did his time with honor.
STOP.
I am signing off. I have no vested interest in Ogden, and most of you on this blog will be happy that I will not be coming back ... at least until it is a brighter destination.
Does that make you happy, Dan S. and Sharon, and Lionel?
Think about the poison that you are spreading, and will you please try to relax ... maybe you all can get together and make Ogden the wonderful place that Ogden can be ... not for us, who tried, but for you, who live there. I personally prefer a hike on the Santa Monica trails. The people you meet there are nicer.
Dear Mr. Rupert, having spent conciderable time in Santa Monica I will grant you that their trails(if you want to call pavement trails) do have more nice bikini clad roller skaters, and if you follow thatpaved sidewalk due east you can get to West Hollywood.(JOY) But they have no Gondola,or Geigers,but there is plenty"artificial" you can wrap your arms around. I know not if their mayor is dishonest,for your sake I hope he is, judging some of the company you keep.A dumb expensive idea is just that.Change for the sake change only is not wise. Do you have any body piercings? If not,try it, that might be a change. How about a wig? Why is it that only people from outside our comunity buy into this landgrab gondola crap,or haven't you noticed?As for your energetic Geiger,you must not have witnessed the way he conducted himself in public over the last couple of years. I'm not too surprised that people may have a very bad impression of him,if they do he can only blame his own behavior for that. I'm sure you feel no real remorse in leaving our fair community as you have reaped your plunder from this scam,maybe not as much as you'd like,but what the hell,wasn't it worth it.$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$Goodbye
Rupert:
I notice that what you spent most of your time discussing was... personalities. Those of many posters unfavorably, that of Mr. Geiger, favorably. Not discussing the merits of the issues involved. And so it seems to me you've fallen into the same practice you condemn in your post. Good spelling doesn't change the nature of the post.
Rupert aka Geiger's....
If we're such a dismal stinking town, why would a man from LaLaLand deign to come here?
Are you so used to backroom dealing and under the table payoffs, that you felt 'at home' and smelled a BIG opportunity up here with the small minded but visionary yokels?
PLEASE do a mockumentary of Ogden....my agent can talk to your agent....ya'll can do lunch. It's safe to eat anywhere here....the cockroaches are only on the 9th floor. And if you turn on the lights...they still scurry, some even leave town...and hike the Santa Monica 'trails'.
Rupert,
You claim to have ties to tinsel town so I'm sure you are familiar with the Christmas time movie staring Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed, “It’s a Wonderful Life”.
Ogden residents, much like the character in the movie played by Jimmy Stewart are trying to protect our Bedford Falls. We do not want our community to turn into a Potterville (or in this case Godfreyville), as you and others decide what our lifestyle should be, how much park land we really need, while you decide who should own our downtown and dictate how our city tax money is spent.
We are in trouble and we are trying to stop the person that is causing the damage so that we can get someone in there that will set us on the right path. We have dug ourselves into a pretty big hole under this administration and it will be a long time coming back.
If you want to blame anyone you should just look at your friends in Ogden (our city administration) as they have successfully delayed the development of effective mass transit in our community, not addressed the needed improvements to our infrastructures thus leaving them in decay, not addressed the need to improve the living standards of our inner city neighborhoods, spent the city into a financial hole, squandered countless city dollars due to their incompetence and then you should blame yourself (if as you claim that your motives are noble rather than for personal gain) for being so gullible to believe these people (your friends) while they continued to spin a story that could only happen on the silver screen. Your belief in their fairy tale story line only encourages them to continue on their not happy ever after ending for the residents of Ogden.
Rupert
How's your buddy Gadi Leshem? I remember mention of a February court date for his multiple felony fraud charges...
Yo Rupy:
you said you would put us in your "next mini series". Damned if I aint excited about that. I might even get to meet Curmudgeon's fantasy Paris Hilton. I heard you and her were hangin buddies and all. (I think Nichole is the cute one, think you could line me up?)
But Rupy, my agent wants to talk to your people first. Wants to know what was your last mini series? Have you ever done a "mini series"? If not, wouldn't that be a little phony of you to say your "next mini series"?
You wouldn't be a bush league Hollywood hustler that does bush league industrials in a wharehouse in the Valley for a guy accused of multiple felonies, now would you Rupy? We are talking Hollywood now are't we Rupy? We don't much wanta get suckered all the way to Hollywood and end up over the hill in Van Nuys you know, Rupy.
Rupert the Producer! Sounds like a Letterman comedy routine.
yeah...grandiose like Chief Operating Officer of Descente.
Lionel...I already suggested that our agents could 'talk and do lunch'....bring your's along too.
Wonder if Rupert will pay us more that scale?
I bet we get a lot of exposure on CH17...kinda like an HBO special.
A word to the wise! There is a conman running around the Weber area that is from California. He claims to be some kind of development mogul. However, after doing some checking, it turns out that he is a high school dropout, barely solvent and has had run-ins with the law in California. Before you enter into any deals, hire a PI and verify all of his grandiose claims before parting with your hard earned money.
Good advise, but there are conmen everywhere
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