It’s rare that I give Mayor Poops props, but he made some interesting comments about density and our core (FF 12:00). The only problem is that he has had more then 3 years to do something with the help of the do-nothing council. He mentions that we need to do a better job of building density in our core. DING! DING! DING! This wasn’t the first Mayor to try to mansplain this issue. Mayor Munson actually took a stab at it when he created the Pettigrew Heights neighborhood and started the rebuilding of Downtown. The problem was when Bucktooth & Bowlcut took the baton he just focused on the immediate Downtown. Fast forward to Paul and the story behind the scenes is that he has been talking to core property owners around the downtown area, the problem, as rumor would have it is that Paul wants to try to strong arm these owners into selling property to the city so he can bulldoze it and turn it around to his rich developer friends. This is what happens when you have a COS that used to be a developer executive. Most of those owners have told them they will redevelop on their own without the help of the city.
The bigger issue with this is that the public, the city council and these owners all need to come to the table and put together a strategy, and the process needs to be very open and transparent. Right now those meetings, like the MED MJ ordinance discussions are happening behind closed doors, and as I understand it are failing miserably.
I’m not sure what it will take to get this mayor to understand open government, he just doesn’t, and neither does the council or the city attorney’s office.
The only way we will will ever succeed with this core redevelopment is if we open the books, unfortunately I don’t think that will ever happen with the current administration.