Sunday, September 30, 2007

Hazard of the job...

Who does Delegate Bobo think she is, volunteering to spend someone else’s money in a letter to the editor? Even if General Growth was going to make a billion dollars (and that number is completely unsubstantiated) what makes Bobo think she can spend it for them?

I replied that, given the very large profit, possibly in the range of a billion dollars, that General Growth Properties Inc. stands to gain from a new master plan for downtown Columbia, they would benefit from resolving this dispute. I suggested that not only the county executive but also the County Council and others in the community should very strongly urge General Growth to buy back the parcel of land from the developer, WCI Communities Inc. I offered to do whatever I could to help in this effort, including flying to General Growth headquarters in Chicago.

Nevermind- she is a politician. She spends other people’s money for a living.

Posted by FreeMarket at 9:21 PM

8 comments:

John G. Boyle said...

FM,

I'm confused: what exactly is it that you have the issue with? That she is involving herself in the process?

Can you clarify?

John B.

October 2, 2007 at 11:55 AM
Anonymous said...

My problem with her “solution” is that she wants to have GGP buy the Tower site, as if GGP were Santa Claus. Easy for her to make that suggestion- her money is not on the table.

October 2, 2007 at 1:34 PM
John G. Boyle said...

Well, yeah... it IS easy to make that suggestion. And unless she has mind-contol or some other power to subjugate others to her will, that's pretty much all it is - a suggestion.

Personally, I think that it stinks that this project is going forward without its being part of the master plan for Columbia. Now, where the fault lies in how that occured, I don't know.

But since folks continue to challenge it, I don't see any reason why Del. Bobo shouldn't mix it up as well and explore alternatives to make her constituents/neighbors happy. She can push, cajole, or threaten GGP all she wants. But as far as I understand it, she can't make them do a blessed thing.

Since it sounds like they were considering it at one point and then did an about-face, I'm not surprised that she'd be aggressive about it.

At some level, I feel sorry for the tower developer who got county approval, and pushed forward. At the same time, I'm a lot more concerned with the local impact of the project. So I'm cool with the Del. inserting herself in the battle. The endgame may certainly be that the tower goes up, and we have to deal with what that means for the future. Then again, it's not built yet...

I wish that my knowledge of this issue wasn't limited to info I've gotten through the filter of media coverage, and maybe you and others who are more intimately familiar with this know something that I don't about the parties involved. I'm just looking at this as a resident who wants planned growth for the area, so that's why I'm quite happy to have the Del. lobby all she wants.

Thoughts? My opinions can be always be revised when a good argument is presented :)

John B.

October 3, 2007 at 9:55 AM
wordbones said...

What really gets me is Ms. Bobo's detachment from business reality.

First of all did she ask WCI if they would even consider selling back the site?

GGP can't exactly force them to sell it.

If I am WCI, the only way I'd consider selling the site back to GGP is if I could make enough additional profit to compensate all of my contract purchasers and recoup all of my out of pocket expenses to date (architectural and engineering costs, legal fees. marketing fees, etc.). My guess is that this alone would make any repurchase cost prohibitive.

I think Liz Bobo is a smart lady and knew that this would be a non starter. I believe she suggested it because she thought it might appease some of her constituents and would get her some good press.

October 4, 2007 at 10:21 AM
John G. Boyle said...

WB,

That sounds plausible...

JB

October 4, 2007 at 12:50 PM
Anonymous said...

wb:

Oh stop. "detachment...reality".
Silly.

JB: You were right in the first take.

October 5, 2007 at 6:58 AM
wordbones said...

You are right, the "detachment from reality" comment was silly.

I have no doubt that Liz Bobo knows exactly what she is doing.

-wb

October 8, 2007 at 11:35 AM
FreeMarket said...

In a recent Business Monthly article, Bobo was quoted as saying something along the lines of (I am paraphrasing here) “even if GGP has to pay twice as much for the lot as they sold it for, they should buy it back.”

Uh, yeah. GGP should also rebuild Mt. Hebron High School and pay for health insurance for everyone in the County.

October 8, 2007 at 11:57 AM

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