The Standard-Examiner's Charlie Trentelman provides a tiptop column this morning, questioning the timing of the recent flurry of "Gondolist Sour Grapes Rants", which we've also discussed recently in this collection of Weber County Forum articles.
Charlie's morning's column provides a brief but focused discussion and analysis of the underlying facts, and then poses for the Std-Ex's general readership a few of the questions we've also been asking here at Weber County Forum:
• "[M]y question is the timing of this obviously coordinated attack. Why now?"Although we confess we differ with Mr. Trentelman's assumption That Boss Godfrey and his pack of loyalist gondola lemmings actually regard the Godfrey-Peterson Landgrab/Gondola Scheme as "dead," we applaud Mr. Trentelman for raising these questions in the public press.
• "So, one has to ask, what’s up? Why is WSU suddenly being blamed for someone else’s failed developments? Is this an attempt to blame WSU for a coming bigger failure?"
• "So, Bob, what’s really up? Why the flurry of letters?"
Reader coments are solicited as always, of course.
9 comments:
HOORAY!
Someone at the Standard has finally asked some intelligent questions.
As one of the professor's whom President Millner is supposed to keep under control, I greatly enjoyed Trentelman's column. Hope he's wrong when he speculates that another big failure is on the horizon--but I fear he may be right.
Yikes! I should say, "as one of the professor's who doesn't know when to use an apostrophe." Sorry! How embarassing.
Oh, and I should commend Trentelman for coming clean and disclosing his conflict of interest. Too bad some other folks in town don't understand this concept.
As Dan notes, a very interesting column. I'd offer only one caveat: Hizzonah The Mayor was asked at a work session by Ms. Jeske some months ago [after he pulled sale of Mt. Ogden Park off the table in the election, and after WSU said no to selling Peterson the University's bench lands] if we were now "through with the gondola." The Mayor replied: "I hope not." At a goals setting meeting with the Council, Hizzonah announced that the flatland gondola [downtown to WSU] was still a major policy goal of his Administration, because he still considered it essential to making Ogden an outdoor adventure destination.
The flatland gondola is, it should be clear to all, as Mr. Trentelman noted, under present economic circumstances, a non-starter. The University isn't selling its land, and the city isn't selling Mr. Peterson Mt. Ogden Park, and here in the midst of the Bush recession, capital to finance highly speculative development projects is not exactly thick upon the ground, and certainly the city itself does not have $45 million or so to sink into a highly speculative flatland municipal gondola. Only someone trapped in the throes of an irrational obsession with the project can possibly fail to see that.
Sadly, that seems to describe our Mayor, the powerful CEO of Ogden City.
And just as sadly, because he is CEO of Ogden City, until he is willing to face reality and let go of his obsession, the gondola will remain an issue --- a relatively minor one, I hope, but an issue none the less.
Curm, Ditto.
And as regarding Trentleman's column, it ranged from
the sort of nice, folksy sentiments that I really like to see in the SE
to a rather astute assessment of the situation:
To wit, in more detail, that things are falling apart for the FOM's leveraged speculations on the Ogden boom, and they are lashing out. For people like that, their own failures are never their own fault.
It's great to watch, as Autumn is on the way, literally and metaphorically.
Danny:
It's great to watch?
I don't think so. Ogden bet a lot on the Junction development, and nothing good for us will come if it doesn't, certainly not financially since we're on the hook for the bonds [despite Hizzonah's assurances otherwise]. I hope the project succeeds still, and I won't be celebrating if it fails, since they're going to deliver the bill to the taxpayers. Another failed downtown development project is in no way good for Ogden.
Curm, sometimes when bad ideas fail early they make room for good ones to succeed.
Perhaps after lying little matty's hand picked cronies fail, they will be replaced with entrepreneurs with their own money and ideas that will succeed. That is unless lying little matty continues to tell them what they can and can't do in his little world, based on his exquisite business acumen. (icecicles, wind tunnels, day glo bowling and $500,000.00 condos, right.
Curm,
Life is both success and failure. And like the great Bill C. says, failure clears away the garbage so the good can flourish - except for so long in Ogden, where the garbage is preserved by government action.
Nature destroys as well as creates. You may dislike forest fires, but they are essential.
Free enterprise involves something called "creative destruction" and it is very good. I understand that since you are a hardcore liberal, you fear this.
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