Redeveloping a concept of local government...

...or

What to do about CHDO?

Last week a notice was posted on the City Government Bulletin Board (NATribune) about the latest quagmire of resource depletion, the Linden Meadows project. No, sadly, the project’s goal was not creating a Linden meadow abutting I-64. It’s conceptually flawed goal was to create affordable housing. But in fact it destroyed a park, a linden meadow? to make way for the project. This “Linden Meadows” could now be named “Erosion Field”.

From what I read, the city has proposed handing 1/2 million dollars to a big bailed-out bank, so they can add 18 blighted properties to the towns glutted inventory of blighted properties. Given the already $600 million National City sucked down at the taxpayer bail-out trough in 2009, just remember, you’ve already bought Linden Meadows. Why pay twice?

Then these dots started connecting, in that stark-raving math kinda’ way in my head.

If the redevelopment wing of local government buys more ghetto, it can turn around and say we need to pay them to redevelop the ghetto! If the city just keeps using tax money to buy more distressed commercial properties, the ghetto grows, and so presumably does the need for “redevelopment”. So then I flip the equation backward and it reads: 50 years of “redevelopment” has created the ghetto NA is today!

Well then, my simple math says if we stop pouring money into government redevelopment fiascos’, and instead force them to use the money for public safety, infrasturcture, and education, the ghetto would go away!! Wow, so simple. So Zen. Reduce city government by better use of technology, eliminate the pretense of gov’t redevelopment, focus on basics, and boom - ethical, sustainable growth.

Here are my personnel pruning shears, let’s see where to start -

Building Commissioner

Carl Malysz

Plan Commission

Carl Malysz- Director of Community Development

John Rosenbarger- Director of Public Facilities Projects

Scott Wood- Chief Planner

Krisjans Streips- Planner

Redevelopment

Carl Malysz - Director of Community Development

John Rosenbarger- Director of Public Facilities Projects

Cyndi Krauss- Financial Compliance Mng.

Sherrie Holmes- Public Service Specialist

Deputy Mayor

Carl Malysz

Wow, a quick cut-n-paste of the NA org chart and the first thing I see - the Mayor doesn’t have a job. So then, you eliminate all the positions above, and give them to the Mayor, then he’d have a full time job. I know - he has no plan or ideas of his own. OK, since his only vision for New Albany seems to be a full pension and expensive free health care for himself, he’ll just have to sit at his desk and make rubber bands balls till his term ends. At least he won’t be out wining and dining every distressed commercial extractor who can stand to spend a lunch with him selling out the city. Mr. Maylsz could go back to the private sector, maybe jump over to the development side, now that he knows how to manipulate the levers of gov’t, there are no doubt countless private entities that would pay market rates for his advice. All the other “redevelopment lifers” downtown can finally go over to the private sector and make real money managing real world redevelopment projects. It’s a win-win for all.

Evansville has combined all community development areas, including especially historic preservation, into one department! Now, there’s an idea. As now configured, our NA gov’t is set up to work against the interests of historic preservation. Maybe a crime like the Tabernacle wouldn’t be repeated if redevelopment and historic preservation were in the same office, working toward mutually beneficial goals? Those are mutually beneficial goals here, right?

Ok, we can have one office downtown that is an umbrella for all community development stuff. But I promise we won’t need half of city government to accomplish helping businesses with permits.

Another positive from shrinking the mandate of our local govt, would be to relieve the need to construct a new city-county building, or at least reduce the additional space needed in the next 1--20 years. A little technology and know-how from the 21th century would go a long way to addressing our over-staffing problems.

One of the solutions to sustainable economic development in New Albany is to get the local government the hell out of it. CHDO, CCE, anything to do with development or redevelopment. God forbid the friggin hospital had just paid to tear down those houses. Now, years and millions later, the hopeful outcome is to return the park to nature and the neighbors. But what is the larger lesson from this disaster?

When I moved back here a few years ago and noticed NA had quite the robust local government redevelopment component, I thought it was a joke. I mean, could people actually preside over the destruction of our town, from what I remember in childhood, and get paid for it? Year after crumbling year? That verges on criminal. The very least a rational person would see is the town has been UN-developed. That is the opposite of developed. Linden Meadows is just the latest and most obvious redevelopment disaster. But I’ve only been paying attention for 40 years.

In less than 6 months, this administration has proposed no less than 3 new ways to bail out the private sector and their governmentally enabled abuse of this town. ENOUGH! Your hands should be full figuring out how to deal with the budget mess, or the sewer mess, or the storm mess,...