Biting the Bullet...

My bad.

The frenzy article from yesterday was done in slight haste and I focused on some things that were out of context. I jumped to conclusions, and I OVER REACTED in a different manner that I felt others were going to do based on what I focused on in the article.

I will leave that post from yesterday in tact, however here I'm going to retract my statements that the Miner (and its journalist) was trying to lead readers astray and that there was an implied smoking gun 'gotcha' moment in that article.

What's fair is fair. I jumped to conclusions and for that I'd like to make amends with anyone who read that particular posting.

The emails for instance. Is there something definitive there or not?? My issue with the email shared in the Miner article is that I didn't think it implicated the developer in anything. It looks like they simply answered a question. If I had read the article more closely, I would have seen the obvious potential conflict of interest. Councilman Deering is right the city should not be hiring a consulting firm that is a client of the developer.

The 'working together' comment. I still maintain that the consultant ultimately chosen to do the report at some point has to get information from the developer to produce the report. I don't feel as this is 'working together', but if in the context that the consultant is a client of the developer then yes they have a working relationship and this particular consultant should not be considered for this project.

The 'giveaways' comment (alluded to by the article from the activist groups that oppose tax incentive programs) still seems like an accounting error issue. I don't think the program is fairly represented here, it is not 'giveaways' it is 'give backs' -- as in the city will be parting with a negotiated rate of collected sales tax in order to pay back the developer over a period of time. To me it is just a poor choice of words to attack the program... a poor choice of words from the activist groups that are against this kind of program.

Yep, I still have questions... I still see value in exploring this particular avenue. But this doesn't mean that this is the only solution that I'd support or be against.

And actually the best solution is probably that the developer has lined up all kinds of great tenants to move on into the Kingman Crossing development. So good that the developer can't wait to get started and says -- screw it, we are tired of messing around with what appears to be a less than competent city complex from the leaders on down. We are doing this ourselves. We are getting bids for construction of the traffic interchange and we'll see you at the grand opening.