Adams whispering sweet nothings to Cogen
It appears that the pushers of the new PSU-OHSU "urban renewal" scam zone are hoping to buy off opposition by Mutnomah County with a bribe of building a new county human resources building somewhere in the new "education urban renewal" district. In exchange for $19 million for a new personnel palace, the county would go along with the real estate weasels' looting tens of millions in property tax dollars from schools and public services around the region and the state.
Is this what "urban renewal" is about -- building government buildings? The City of Portland will rake the dollars away from the schools, and hand them to the county for construction? Can that be legal?
Speaking of legality, whatever happened to the $9 million in "urban renewal" funds that the city handed over to the county, supposedly to reroute traffic coming off the Hawthorne Bridge to make room for a new county courthouse? Those funds were borrowed by the city, and transferred to the county, nearly four years ago. Since nothing has been built, and there are no plans to build anything there any time soon, shouldn't the county be paying the money back? Certainly the folks who bought the "urban renewal" bonds weren't told that the proceeds would be transferred to another government entity, to be spent on any old thing or allowed to sit idle indefinitely.
| Posted at 2:18 PM | Permalink |
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Comments (12)
Only 300 days left....gotta keep busy!
Icons linchpins and sustainable, Oh my!
Posted by Portland Native | March 6, 2012 2:52 PM
Such pesky and impertinent questions!
Posted by Allan L. | March 6, 2012 3:37 PM
The next 300 days might see a lot of smash-and-grab going on.
Posted by Mr. Grumpy | March 6, 2012 3:51 PM
That is why insider plans work so well with making sure key people are strategically placed. Jeff Cogen came out of city, Saltzman's office. What do you think he will do?
Posted by clinamen | March 6, 2012 6:45 PM
Isn't it also true that some of Sam's promises to Multnomah Co. are for projects, programs outside of the proposed PSU/OHSU URA? Besides being a scam and illegal per State statutes, I thought that recent yelling about this practice has vetted out the scam it is.
Where's the police? Cogan better wise up because he's being smeared politically. Citizen's are catching on and it won't shine nicely on Cogan's aspirations. Even though "D" stands tall in Multnomah Co., the misuse of urban renewal that affects public services-Multnomah's now primary function-is not a D or R issue. Common sense is creeping into the discussion on urban renewal.
Posted by Lee | March 6, 2012 7:17 PM
The entire state is rotten to the core. It's like West Virginia without the coal.
Posted by Mister Tee | March 6, 2012 7:55 PM
I hear Portland Public Schools is getting an earmark from Adams and crew with this urban renewal scheme. Something to do with putting Lincoln High school in the zone so it gets money for upgrading.
Actually, using urban renewal for rebuilding schools may help reduce Portland Public Schools' upcoming construction bond/tax proposal. Urban renewal subjects all other city property tax levies to tax compression, wherebye the city and county are limited to a total tax rate of no more than $10 per 1k in real market value assessment. So urban renewal has the potential through tax compression (measure 5 limits) to squeeze other county and city service share of property tax revenues.
I love tax compression and think it should be expanded to include all government taxes and fees such that no one individaul can have say 30% or more of his or her income confiscated by all forms of government in entirety.
Posted by Bob Clark | March 6, 2012 10:12 PM
Bob Clark says: Something to do with putting Lincoln High school in the zone so it gets money for upgrading.
If that's the case, then the Portland and PPS can get into some serious "colors of money" legal trouble.
It's doubly curious because last time around, PPS had to funnel $5 million of bond money to the city to get Sam off their backs about some planning disputes.
Posted by Garage Wine | March 7, 2012 6:32 AM
hy isn't this a felony?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDJ9VfLHurg
Posted by INFO | March 7, 2012 8:17 AM
Ha, silly people. There will be no lawsuits, prosecutions, or even bad PR about this other than one curmudgeonly blog... It distracts from the "Big Picture."
If we've learned anything in the last 4 years, it's that the powers that be, from the city to the national level, nay, the global level, have a lock on the message, the regulators, the watchdogs, and the police.
Personally, I can't wait for it all to burn down.
Posted by Don Smith | March 7, 2012 8:34 AM
INFO, the youtube video of Sam's proposed Central City URA is definitely a violation of State UR statutes. "Felony"?, it should be.
Statutes say that URAs have to be contiguous. At 2.32 and 2.46 it shows the Morrison bridgehead and University District not contiguous. But there are several other loose interpretations, like "blight". There are numerous blocks in the all encompassing map that aren't blight.
As grievous as this proposal is, plus mixing funds, paybacks with PPS in and outside the proposed URA, it's likely a petition to vote on this might happen- even in laissez faire Portland. But then maybe a few legal challenges might come first to avoid that time/money consuming endeavor.
Posted by lw | March 7, 2012 10:26 AM
According to David Wynde, PPS Deputy CFO, the district "loses" $10 million a year on URA funding. These URA's are supposed to have an end life but are often extended. My understanding is that in 2006 the legislature changed, for NEW URA's so that PPS is compensated by the state. Portland is not the only entity with URA's but the amount is staggering compared to other cities/entities. Wondering when the rest of the state's citizens are going to wake up and demand that Portland stop robbing from them since we cannot take action ourselves.
Posted by teresa | March 7, 2012 11:08 AM