Why does reading the following give me hives?

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"Although Adams did not reveal details of the plan, he said it involved fast-tracking contracts with the private sector that would create jobs and stimulate the economy."

The table is set for corruption.

Maybe we could use some money to recruit some folks like this to serve on the PPB:

http://is.gd/fq6A

Using the city’s allocation of federal Neighborhood Stabilization Funds to buy foreclosed properties.

Somebody please tell me why the city needs to own foreclosed properties?
Maybe they could use the "Neighborhood Stabilization Funds" to fix infrastructure in neighborhoods? Maybe fix soccer fields that poison children? How about fix sewer pipes that are causing problems in older neighborhoods?

Idiots.

They need to own real estate so that they can give it away to their friends.

"I want the council to be more aggressive in helping businesses and residents."

God save us all.

Sam, 89% of us don't need an "aggressive council helping our businesses or homes. We need government to stop its insidious infiltration and growth, and we'd be better off.

Did they mean Portland?

FOUND ON THE WEB: HOW TO GET A CONTRACT IN ILLINOIS

Three contractors are bidding to fix a broken fence at the Governor's Mansion in Springfield , Illinois ; one from Chicago , another from Tennessee and a third from Kentucky . They all go with the governor to examine the fence. The Tennessee contractor takes out a tape measure and does some measuring, then works some figures with a pencil. "Well", he says, "I figure the job will run about $900: $400 for materials, $400 for my crew and $100 profit for me."

The Kentucky contractor also does some measuring and figuring, then says, 'I can do this job for $700: $300 for materials, $300 for my crew and $100 profit for me.' The Chicago contractor doesn't measure or figure, but leans over to and whispers, '$2,700.' The Governor is incredulous and whispers back, 'You didn't even measure like the other guys. How did you come up with such a high figure?' The Chicago contractor whispers back, '$1000 for me, $1000 for you, and we hire that guy from Kentucky to fix the fence.' 'Done!' And that, my friends, is how it all works in Illinois politics.

Want to help the average Portland resident?

Stop the campaign to make most of our arterials look like the rut tracks from the Oregon Trail. Repair the damn streets already.

On the topic of baseball stadium names, we already have Unthank park on the corner of Failing and Haight (Hate?).

Unthank, as in NO THANKS.

"The goal is to stimulate the economy by speeding up the city’s permitting process."

Randy Leonard. Speed up things. Make them more efficient. Been a govt employee his whole life. Designed PFDR.

BWA-HAA-HAA!

I'd love to see a stat for average time from application to final approval and see if it has changed at all

What a load of bull.
Typical Portland Bull.

Never a lesson learned or failure aknowledged.

Sam the Tram thinks streetcars are the linchpins to economic recovery.

Buying forclosed properties?
Of course. Let's give the PDC some more parcels to use as subsidies.

Speed up the permit process?
We were already told Leonard had already done that. So whatever additional "speed up" occurs will be of no significance at all.

There's not a thing the city leadership will do but make things worse.

The Oregonian editorial today that talks about Adams and Gill Kelly has Katz crediting Kelly for making SoWa happen.

See how it works around here.

Those who should be blamed for the big boondoggle flops give each other credit for them.

Fast-tracking contracts and appropriating property? Yeah, sounds exactly like what happened when George W. and his buddies "liberated" private property to build The Ballpark (for years, that was its actual name) for the Texas Rangers. The same thing's going on with the new stadium for the Dallas Cowboys in Arlington, Texas, and we won't even get into the sleazy tax abatement game Ray Hunt of Hunt Oil worked out to give the Dallas Stars a new stadium at the beginning of the decade. (Well, I'll note that Hunt had complete control of parking revenues, airspace, and mineral rights on the old Reunion Arena, as well as a 20-year tax abatement, and amazingly decided that the city needed to pay for a new stadium when the abatement was ready to end. Now he's sticking the City of Dallas with the costs of demolishing Reunion Arena, probably so he can build another overpriced tourist trap.)

The problem here is that nobody learns from the past. More importantly, the boosters, like Sam the Tram, always figure that even though the arena proponents have a track record for similar scams, this time the boosters won't be sodomized with a bowling trophy and left for dead. After a while, the boosters start sounding like abused spouses: "He won't rip me off and laugh in my face when I call him on contractual obligations! He promised this time!"

"Taxpayer Field" was proposed for the Mets' new stadium in Queens. I'd vote for that for the Paulson family's new toy.

"Some funding will come from the $900 million in reserves, bond funds and other financial holding the city has on hand."

Other thing, why isnt any of this being used to fix roads or sewers?

If they want to keep the costs down they should auction off the naming rights with a blind bidding process. The only guideling should be a 25 letter limit to the title and no vulgarity.

Maybe we could take up a collection for naming rights?

I think "Pork Park" has a nice ring to it.

When these comments are combined with highly detailed criticisms that followed up on the original Trib article, you get the idea that there's serious outrage over Sam Adams' fatuous PR-wise pronouncements. In fact, there probably is. But when will it reach critical mass to actually influence the wheeling and dealing in our glorious City Hall? Don't hold your breath, sad to say.

When will the electoral realize that Sam is mostly PR? He has more ideas, blueribbon committees, outreaches, town halls, charettes, than feathers on a pigeon.

I met to say "feathers on his chickens".