I decided to watch from home tonight, I have no doubt the funding will pass even though only 6 members will be voting on it next week. I guess there is even a part of me that is still kind of neutral on the topic, since I do support it’s opening soon and have helped in the past with private fundraisers. I do understand the economic impact of the State Theatre would eventually pay itself back in the form of entertainment taxes (one of the few smart things I have ever heard Kiley say).
The money isn’t the big issue. As councilor Starr pointed out, we could easily take it out of the enormous reserve fund and it wouldn’t even make a blip.
My issues are;
• We shouldn’t take it out of Entertainment tax fund, it does set a precedent.
• 1st Reading was done without a completed contract (the finance director said it won’t be completed until Thursday and the council won’t be able to make any changes – or only minor ones). This is also a precedent because we had a 1st reading before we had a completed contract (still completely baffled by this).
• We are doing this on the whim of a Billionaire, and that is what torques me off the most. We should be making these gifting decisions based on what citizens want, and to be honest with you, besides the administration, the city council, the board members of the State Theatre and a handful of DT business owners I haven’t heard one single citizen tell me they are ok with giving this money, in fact most don’t even know or care.
But what was most fun (disgusting) to watch was the performance of three of the members of the RS5, and their ‘I was against this before I was for it.’ Yeah right.
Theresa tried to get it deferred for two weeks because she was going to be gone next week and she wanted time to look over the contract. Soehl, in his true clown car sort of way, informed Theresa that he would be gone next week to, and it didn’t matter, because the city’s business needs to keep moving (like this is some kind of emergency – the project has been farting around for almost 25 years, an extra week isn’t going to kill it). But what was even more funny is Soehl said he supported the gift even though he has never been in the building.
Besides Kiley making a good point about the economic impact he told one of his sappy stories that no one gives Two Sh*ts about.
Like I said, the train is already down the tracks and if I was the State Theatre board, I would have cracked the champagne bottle tonight, because there is nothing the RS5 won’t refuse, especially if it keeps their heads well mounted up Denny’s butt.
Hopefully they will play my favorite comedy of all time, “Coming to America.”
Rev. Brow: “If loving the Lord is wrong, then I don’t wanna be right!”