We're going to do something here at Weber County Forum that we haven't done in a good long time. We're going to submit today's article to a complete re-write.Earlier today we leapfrogged off today's Standard-Examiner article, and hastily published what we confess to have been a half-baked opinion piece, criticising in part the reporting of Ace Reporter Schwebke, and his story about last night's Emerald City RDA session. So stunned were we that last night's meeting didn't result in a flurry of new bonding, that we overlooked a few highly essential points. Here's what we originally said:
We find a puzzling Scott Schwebke story in this morning's Standard-Examiner, regarding the American Can development project. The Emerald City RDA board last night amended the existing development agreement governing that project, the article reports; however our favorite Ace Reporter provides not the slightest clue as to the substance of that amendment. We incorporate Mr. Schwebke's hopelessly vague "descriptive" paragraph here:Here's the part of Mr. Schwebke's article we failed to highlight:
"OGDEN — The Ogden Redevelopment Agency agreed Tuesday night to amend a development agreement enabling a developer to secure a $3.7 million bank loan to renovate Building D within the former American Can Co. complex."
That's it folks. That single paragraph is all this story provides us regarding the nature of last night's development agreement amendment. From this point the story rambles off into an odd array of largely irrelevant tangents, leaving interested readers scratching their heads, wondering exactly what substantive change the RDA Board made to the existing development agreement.
The development agreement amendments approved by the RDA board, made up of city council members, will enable Peddie to borrow funds from Wells Fargo Bank to make improvements to Building D, said Richard McConkie, the city’s deputy director of community and economic development.Several of our gentle readers immediately set us straight about this glaring omission on our part; and we have thus somewhat sheepishly re-written today's article. Ace Reporter Schwebke did indeed provide us most of the essentials to last night's RDA session story, which boil down to these elemental points:
Peddie plans to lease about 57,000 square feet on three floors in Building D to Amer Sports Corp., an international outdoor gear company.
The development agreement amendments call for Peddie to form a single entity, AmCan Properties I LLC, to own and operate Building D, said McConkie.
The amendments also allow tax increment by Building D to be pledged by Peddie to secure the Wells Fargo loan.
The development agreement for the complex renamed the AmeriCan Center calls for Peddie to receive 75 percent of the tax increment generated by improvements through 2017. Those proceeds are expected to total about $1.6 million, McConkie said.
Our Emerald City RDA Board apparently handed another Friends of Matt (FOM) another fat taxpayer subsidy last night, once again reprising the tired Boss Godfrey refrain:
Emerald City remains "the armpit of Utah;" the only way to turn this city's economy around is to round up a few FOM's and reward them generously.
We regret our error, and apologize to Mr. Schwebke for what we now consider to have been unwarranted criticism.
We also apologize to our gentle readers, for posting the original article "on the fly."
We aim for perfection here on Weber County Forum, and we'll now eat another bite of delicious and nutritious "crow."
On another topic, we'll briefly highlight another Standard-Examiner Letter to the Editor, appearing on this morning's editorial page. Judging from this Donna Gardner letter, it would appear that it's not just Weber County Forum readers who are a mite suspicious of Boss Godfrey's "Godfrey the Crimefighter" 2007 election campaign platform plank. If anyone amongst our readership knows Ms. Gardner, we hope they will refer her here. As regular Weber County Forum readers know, in the arena of crime-fighting, Boss Godfrey isn't merely an exaggerator -- but rather an outright prevaricator.
The floor is open. Talk about any of the above... or whatever else floats your boat.
