Sam and Randy get the deal done
We'll put the new minor league baseball stadium in the Rose Quarter. We'll knock down the Memorial Coliseum and put it there. No, wait... how about we leave the Coliseum there and squeeze baseball in? It'll be quirky -- really cool -- like Fenway. No, wait... maybe across Broadway on the school district property.
We'll pay for it with money from the Convention Center urban renewal pork district. No, wait... that's been promised to somebody else... how about the Interstate Avenue urban renewal pot?
We'll pay for the new soccer stadium with a new urban renewal district taking in all of northwest Portland. No, wait... that won't fly. We'll pay for it with... with... we'll get back to you on that.
But remember, Portland -- we know what we're doing and we're driving a hard bargain for the taxpayers here. Just look at our numbers! No, wait... that's right, those numbers are wrong. The consultant guy was sick and he had to do the math on the plane...
(To be continued)
| Posted at 9:52 AM | Permalink |
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Comments (11)
Enough already, Sam and Randy! No more obeisance and kowtowing to the Paulsons. They're not actually royalty, you know. Jack's just kidding when he calls Merritt "Little Lord Paulson."
Show the City of Roses that you have some pride, self-respect and sense left by walking away from this deal.
Posted by A Hopeful | April 21, 2009 11:29 AM
"O there's a new plan....born every minute...." (to the tune of you know what)
What with rooms....no, buildings.... full of planners....Metro, COP, PDC, and we're insulted with this seat of the pants, one-day-one-way, the-next-day-altogether-different scramble to remake a neighborhood that's been studied to death for years. If the process weren't so terribly criminal and amateur, it would truly be laughable. Piper Paulsen plays the tune, and the City Hall troupe dances in silly circles.
GAWD!....recall the lot of them. It gets worse by the day.
Posted by veiledorchid | April 21, 2009 11:37 AM
Wouldn't it be classic if Sam's frantic, slapstick burst of spending projects - designed to show why he's so vital and thus shouldn't be removed from office - is ultimately what makes the difference in getting him tossed out?
Maybe if he had just done the job he would have done without the scandal, the public would be comfortable with his leadership by now. People enjoy a steady calm person in charge - they don't like sudden lurches from government.
It's like Randy Leonard's temper. It gets attention at first but ultimately the public feels like we need someone with a slower fuse.
And say what you want about our last mayor but at least Tom Potter came off as an old-school adult. You could see Sam was dismissive of him, but looking back Sam should have been trying to learn. He could use a little of that dull, plodding pace. The voters know that if things are going wrong, at least they're not going wrong very fast.
That's a calmness that a leader should provide.
Instead, the image we have is of a hyperactive lunatic racing from one press conference to another. It's like those grocery store contests where you get a minute to fill your cart. Sam is running up and down the aisles cramming as many items into the cart as possible before the horn sounds in July.
It's classic self-destructive behavior.
He's trying so hard not to get thrown out, that he's going to get thrown out.
Posted by Bill McDonald | April 21, 2009 11:40 AM
"We'll put the new minor league baseball stadium in the Rose Quarter"
...You left out the earlier bait and switch public distraction rouse:
"Let's take away a public park, give it to a private business and cram the new stadium into Lents"
Posted by RANZ | April 21, 2009 11:57 AM
Joke time (apologies to Mr McDonald):
Guy goes into barber shop and says to customer: "See that kid, if I give him a choice, he'll always take two quarters over a dollar bill." Customer says show me, so barber offers and kid takes two quarters.
Customer later sees kid walking out of ice cream store and asks him why he took two quarters instead of a dollar.
Kid says: "If I take the dollar, the game is over."
Barber = Leonard/Adams Kid = Paulson
Posted by Steve | April 21, 2009 12:17 PM
Sam looked a combination of sedated and constipated last night while rambling on about temporarily sparing the Memorial Coliseum while ferreting out a place in the Rose Quarter for the stadium.
What is the Rose Quarter anyway? Some kind of magic triangle that entertainment should be packed into chock-a-block? Some sort of Disney/Pinnochio-like Island of Lost Boys designed to draw in a dwindling number of people with discretionary income? It isn't working for Condo City in the Pearl and it's not going to work in the Rose Quarter, here, now. I remember when it was the Elliot neighborhood and people actually lived there.
Why not either drastically renegotiate the financials for the stadia deal and concentrate of how the neglected Coliseum could be put to work for the community at large in a meaningful way?
Posted by NW Portlander | April 21, 2009 1:28 PM
"Leadership" has never looked so much like a pen of headless chickens, has it?
Mayor Quimby: "If that's the way the winds are blowing, let no one say that I don't also blow!"
Posted by Snards | April 21, 2009 1:45 PM
"Kid says: "If I take the dollar, the game is over.""
That is awesome!
Posted by Don Smith | April 21, 2009 2:07 PM
Wheeler for Mayor.
Actually, any responsible adult with a shred of sanity and a clue about fiscal sustainability for Mayor.
Posted at BoJack COP debt clock: $9,385 per Citizen of Portland
Posted by dyspeptic | April 21, 2009 2:14 PM
Okay...Build the new baseball stadium where the SD#1 properties are north of the Coliseum.
That will allow for three separate events to be scheduled in the Rose Quarter area all at once.
Won't that be fun?
Go By Streetcar!
Posted by godfry | April 21, 2009 9:03 PM
I saw Sam out at Delta Park today with a 100 ft tape with Randy holding the dummy end.
Posted by lw | April 21, 2009 10:24 PM