As the nation sinks deeper into recession, The Standard-Examiner reports this morning that the Ogden City administration, growing ever-desperate in its attempt to make it appear that at least something positive is happening in downtown Ogden, has leaked the information that the IRS is planning construction of a new 150,000 sq. ft. Ogden office facility, which will bring as many as 500 new jobs to the downtown area:
• Ogden addition likelyWe greet this information as exceptionally good news for our city. Unlike the long parade of fly-by-nite developer wannabes whom our "visionary" mayor has dragged into town over the past few years, this one doesn't appear to be flat broke... not yet, at least.
Step up and take a bow, Mayor Godfrey! Credit where credit's due.
We'll be keeping our fingers crossed that you won't somehow manage to screw this one up.
12 comments:
Oh, and Gadi profits again.
IF Godfrey had not torn down the Mall, that was the first preference of the IRS 10 years ago. but no little Matty had to have his arcade there instead.
Rudi, I think your giving credit to the Lil Lord for this potential new IRS building is premature. I fail to see anything in this story that attributes this possible IRS building to the Lil Lord or his minions. Rather it seems that the IRS is just considering consolidating a few more of its area offices into one bigger campus down town.
Also found it interesting that Bill Brunson, the IRS official spokesman, said he is not aware of any "immediate plans to build any additional facilities down town".
Seems there may be more grasping at straws here than there is any imminent new down down building.
Oz:
I noticed the Brunson comment too. I'm surprised, given that the IRS has, he says, "no immediate plans" to begin building another IRS tower block downtown that the SE gave the story banner headline treatment on the front page. A story about a possible building moving one step closer would have been appropriate in the business section, but a banner headline for a project the IRS has "no immediate plans" to begin? Odd.
But I don't wish to be merely a critic on this point. I want to help the SE out. So I'll post here a front page story we will doubtless see in the paper tomorrow morning. The SE is welcome to it, free of charge:
Ogden --- Utah Congressman Rob Bishop today denounced IRS plans to build a new five story office tower in downtown Ogden. "This is," said Bishop, "yet another example of wasteful government spending and pork-barrel politics." Bishop said he has long opposed wasteful federal spending and he intends to introduce a bill shortly to forbid the IRS from "spending another dime on a new IRS building in Ogden."
"People need to understand," Ogden told the Standard Examiner, "that this building will not bring jobs to Ogden. It will not bring construction jobs in the short term, or 500 IRS jobs in the long term. As the new head of the Republican National Committee explained last week, projects like this create work but not jobs. Wasn't anyone listening?"
Bishop added that his principles will not permit him to sit idly by while millions more in debt is created to build the IRS tower in Ogden, "debt our grandchildren will have to pay," adding that "constant vigilance is the price of fiscal conservatism."
Mayor Matthew Godfrey [R-Ogden] was unavailable for comment regarding Bishop's promise to work to defeat the proposed IRS building in his city.
drove by the location today and i am still scratching my head on this one. the access to the location is next to the 24th street via-dock on the one way one lane road heading to wall ave.
why would this location be the spot of choice considering all of the more suitable property locations in the city for both access and construction of a 5 story building. parking is going to be a whole nother issue. if this is truely the spot chosen by the irs then a parking facility will be the next shoe to drop because without parking this location just doesnt work. hold on to your wallets ogden residents cause i can see whats coming next.
Is it my imagination, or does the Mayor and his administration have a pattern of making big announcements about projects that the proposed partners don't seem to know anything about?
Here the administration is announcing a new building that the IRS doesn't know about. I recall another time where the city announced that a Tile company was going to buy a building from them when it turns out the Tile company didn't know anything about it. It seems like there are more incidences like this.
What gives with these guys? Why can't they get the city's story in line with the real world?
I'd like to say I think Curm's parody of Rob Bishop in his faux article above is way wide of the mark.
Rob has been a good congressman. Let's not forget he voted against the bailout even under intense pressure from his own president.
Curm's parody falls flat, demonstrating two things:
Good parody must have a germ of truth.
Although some make parody look easy, it's harder than it looks, apparently.
I think the city was approached by a distributer for that property but the mayor only wanted him to move his business to BDO, which the distributor declined. He built his million dollar wharehouse in Farr West, more tax revenue lost from Ogden city limits.
Why does everything have to be only the Mayors idea, how many more failed developments can the city pay for with tax payers money.
Danny:
Cong. Bishop has, over the last three terms, repeatedly thundered his fiscal conservatism from the soap box, and his animus toward pork. And yet, every time he runs for re-election, in the months before the vote, he starts bragging to his constituents about how much money and how many projects he brought to northern Utah. He did it in the election just completed. He is not in any way unique in this. Many many congressmen [of both parties] do the same. But it does make him a hypocrite on the issue of fiscal conservatism, along with the rest of them. He joins the large number of others who think pork is money spent in somebody else's district, but federal money spent in his is not.
I'd give more credence to your claim that he's been a conscientious steward of the public's money if he'd also voted against the bloated Bush budgets of the previous six years [including the one including funds for the bridge to nowhere], and if he hadn't suddenly discovered the "nay" button on his desk only when a Democratic president took office.
I suspect lying little matty just feels the need to add a more positive headline to his scrap book. Problem will be that when he looks back years from now, none of the headlines will be followed by subsequent headlines trumpeting completion, the exception being the jackass center and it's huge public cost.
Might be this is a diversion from the loss of another Washington Blvd. business moving to a neiboring city. The DI is moving to Harrisville, and it's looking like their building a big one. But it's hard to call them high adventure outdoor recreation related, but right after the chris peterson double secret land grab proposal that never got proposed, they did come into a very large supply of used decsente jackets and mittens.
I guess the point is, this guy's even running the used, second hand retail out of town.
Oh well, he has had partial success in the parking lot arena, though they usually involve building them with public dollars then giving them away to his cronies, and of course when he misplaces them.
The Junction Center looks better every day. We just wish it had a brick facade instead of the stucco.
On a similar note, we like what Divinci is doing downtown, and the Tree House Childrens Museum.
Now, if we could just get a few dozen ma & pa business onto Washington blvd, businesses like skate shops, more bars, more tattoo parlors, more drinking establishments, and perhaps a large multistory dance club down town?
And a head shop. Downtown needs more head shops.
Those extreme sports snowboarders cant get enough of black light posters, it seems.
RJ
I like your ideas about what down town needs. May I add whore houses? Ogden doesn't seem to have any - anymore (except the one on the ninth floor of the city building).
If we are going to relive Ogden's glorious past we need more whore houses.
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