Archive for April, 2010
Stimulus Money to Save County Money on Medical Mart
Posted by Roldo Bartimole in Economic Development on April 30, 2010
April 30, 2010… Cuyahoga County could save up to $1 to $2 million a year in interest for the Medical Mart/Convention Center by using bond borrowings allowed by federal stimulus subsidies. The subsidy would decrease the cost of borrowing.
The savings would depend upon interest rates at the time bonds are issued, likely this year.
Federal stimulus programs allow the County to reduce interest costs on some $94.1 million in borrowing, according to County officials.
I questioned whether the subsidies could be used for other County projects. According to Matt Rubino, County director of Budget and Management, this subsidy could not have been used for other County projects.
However, Rubino said, other County General Obligation bonds – some $43 million – had been used already via the stimulus funding to help support the County’s new Juvenile Justice Center cost.
Tim Offtermatt, senior vice president of Stifel Nicolaus & Co., said that bonds for the project could be issued as early as September of this year. He is handling some financial aspects of the bonds. Squire, Sanders & Dempsey also will participate in the bond issuance.
The stimulus money gives the County the ability to borrow at a lower cost. It is not a grant but allows the cost of borrowing to be lowered as the feds subsidize some of the cost. The federal subsidy will apply to some 45 percent of the interest on $94 million in bonds, according to Rubino.
Cuyahoga County was able to increase the amount of bonding to be covered by the special funding because other counties in the state did not use the total allocated for Ohio. Money from the unused state allocation was then shifted to Cuyahoga County at its request.
The complicated allocation of subsidy allows the County to use some $20 million of borrowings on public aspects of the project. For example, the cost of new sidewalks, grass and reconstruction over the rebuilt underground convention center and new street reconstruction would be eligible for the subsidy.
The federal subsidy would lower the interest costs even below the cost that would apply to tax-exempt bonding for public purposes. Because of the private aspects of this development by MMPI of Chicago, bonds would not have necessarily been at tax-exempt rates.
Bonds that were not tax exempt would have cost the County project more dearly.
The County has collected more than $91 million in sale taxes on the quarter percent sales tax voted by the County Commissioners for this project. The tax has a 20-year term. It took effect January 2008. It will likely raise some $800 million over 20 years. The project’s estimated cost – without the cost of borrowing – is some $425 million.
I had questioned whether the County could have used this special subsidy to enable it to do other projects, for example, redevelopment of the Ameritrust property at E. 9th and Euclid Avenue.
According to Offtermatt, the Medical Mart/Convention Center project is the only one ready to go, a stipulation for the use of the special stimulus program funds via the state allocation.
County officials said that this should insure the project would come in within budget. We’ll see.
Atlantic Yards: Fight Worth Fighting is a Fight Worth Fighting to the Very End
Posted by Roldo Bartimole in Economic Development on April 24, 2010
April 24, 2010… The powerful Cleveland Ratner family has finally pushed the Daniel Goldstein family out of its Brooklyn, N. Y. home. But they haven’t shut him up.
And it cost them $3 million, not the $500,000 deal first offered.
Goldstein says that he took the offer without a pledge to keep quiet about it. Although he had to step aside as chief spokesperson of the citizen organization – Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn (DDDB) – he didn’t sign on, as usually happens, to retreat from speaking about the project.
“Contrary to press reports I have not given up my First Amendment rights or my involvement in Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn,” said Goldstein.
Bruce Ratner, head of the development firm called Forest City Ratner, is building the Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn – a housing, retail and arena development.
Goldstein has led a vigorous citizen’s revolt against the project. It seems to me a model of opposition nationally for citizen’s groups fighting rapacious development that destroys communities.
Here are some links to find out more about the project and its opposition: http://www.nolandgrab.org/ and Goldstein’s
statement on the agreement between Goldstein and Ratner:
http://www.dddb.net/php/latestnews_Linked.php?id=2712
And finally, DDDB’s organizational statement on the deal:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: April 23, 2010
The following is a statement from Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn’s Board of Directors and Steering Committee:
As many of you know, our colleague, Daniel Goldstein, co-founder and spokesperson for Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn, reached an agreement on Wednesday with New York State and Forest City Ratner to vacate his home by May 7th. With little leverage – a state Supreme Court judge had already allowed the state to take title to his home on March 1st – Daniel was forced to relinquish his role as spokesperson for DDDB in order to secure a reasonable settlement for his family. While we are saddened to lose him as a spokesperson, we wholly and unequivocally support his decision.
As Daniel made clear in the statement he issued yesterday, however, he will continue to play a key role with DDDB as we fight on against the Atlantic Yards project, and he refused – at the risk of scuttling the settlement entirely – to agree to the gag order that Forest City Ratner so badly wanted him to accept. And most of you will not know this: over the past 6 years Daniel rejected four attempts by Ratner to get him to drop the two key eminent domain lawsuits on which he was lead plaintiff.
It is impossible for us to adequately express our admiration for, and our gratitude to, Daniel for the incredible work he’s done over the past six-and-a-half years on behalf of DDDB and the broad coalition of property owners, tenants and community groups fighting Atlantic Yards. While he has certainly not been alone in this fight, he was the only one among us who owned a home on the spot on which Bruce Ratner wanted to build center court. Without Daniel and his principled desire to stay in his home, this fight would likely have been over long ago. Thanks in large part to Daniel’s steadfastness, and to your efforts and financial support, our battle for justice goes on.
While Daniel has played a critical and tireless role, he’d be the first to say that the fight against Atlantic Yards is much, much bigger than Daniel Goldstein, and about so much more than one man trying to save his home. It’s about putting a stop to eminent domain abuse, backroom deals, the squandering of public assets, transparency in government and the workings of democracy – and making sure something like Atlantic Yards never, ever happens again, anywhere. The thousands of you who have donated your hard-earned money and your time to DDDB to fight Atlantic Yards have done so to save a neighborhood, and a borough, a city, and a state, from eminent domain abuse and the ugly corruption of public process.
That’s why we will continue to press the fight in court, pursuing the Article 78 lawsuit seeking to compel the Empire State Development Corporation to issue new Determinations and Findings for the Atlantic Yards project, along with the suit seeking to overturn state approval of the Modified General Project Plan, for which we filed a motion to reconsider on April 8th based on clear evidence that the state intentionally omitted critical evidence from the public record. And it’s why we will continue to push state and city officials to find the political will to stop or alter the project. And why we’ll continue to work with elected leaders like state Senator Bill Perkins to pass legislation that fundamentally protects the rights of home and business owners in New York State from eminent domain abuse.
DDDB and Daniel have stood for, and continue to stand for responsible development. We continue to stand by our principles. We have never opposed development and never opposed affordable housing. We have advocated for responsibly developing the rail yards—through a democratic process with real community input—with affordable housing and truly accessible open space. We have fought against the abuse of power that subverted the City’s democratic land use review processes, and misused the power of eminent domain that resulted in the taking of Daniel’s home and the homes and businesses of many others. It was a misuse of a power that in the past—and in this instance—victimized many, especially people not as fortunate as Daniel to have had the ability to wage a fight against the abuse of that power.
All of us are sick and tired of Bruce Ratner and the ESDC and Atlantic Yards, with good reason. It’s never been a fair fight, and the deck has been stacked in Ratner’s favor from the very start. But fights worth fighting are worth fighting to the end. Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn is not giving up the fight, Daniel Goldstein isn’t giving up the fight, and we know that you’re not willing to give up the fight, either. As Daniel wrote yesterday: see you at the next meeting.