Thursday, May 3, 2007

My Astonishment

I wandered over to SYLVESTER!!!!!!!!'s blog and they some how are complaining about the city's option to buy the Omni Source land. CHECK IT OUT

Mind you, this is a guy that complains about the lack of city planning. I agree that our city is inept when it comes to city planning and the zoning board seems to allow any type of development to go up. My question is - with HS and complaints that we didn't offer any RFPs for future development, how is the option the wrong thing to do? If we open it up to private investors, then the city can not do any city planning, we are at the mercy of FW Zoners - and we know that if a millionaire dust farmer came in a wanted to mine for asbestos - we'd probably have an asbestos mine and a couple of new strip malls inside downtown FW. The great thing about the option is the price, now with development on the horizon, the price would be upward bound.

Also, they are complaining about the liquor licenses, and the possibility for the discount rates with the riverfront development. Last time I checked, the prices were around 80k for a three-way license(I could be wrong, but I'd never admit to it), this would indicate the demand is severely down from when Club Soda bought theres for ~300k. Heaven forbid there actually be competition, but wouldn't competition hopefully bring more people? I'd actually like to be able to visit multiple places without driving, but I realize when people go out to multiple places, they tend to call visiting all of Piere's 'five clubs' - bar hopping.

8 comments:

fairplaybeach said...

There's no 3-ways available at the moment. 300 K? Sounds like they got screwed on that... or they just wanted one badly. Does Club Soda have a 3-way? I've only been there once and had to leave bacause of all the snobs...

LP Mike Sylvester said...

CFW:

Who is "They?"

I wrote the post and I am a singular person not a group...

I think that a Private Developer should purchase the Omnisource site and develop it. It is a system I like to call Free Market Capitalism.

I do complain about a complete lack of City planning and I stick to my statement. Glad you agree.

I am not against the option. I have said several times that I am ok with an option to purchase the property; however, I want a Private Developer to purchase the property not the City of Fort Wayne.

Per the ILBA The City of Fort Wayne has 65 more licenses then our population is allotted, mainly due to annexation. The last thing we need to do is introduce more licenses.

You may not understand liquor licenses if you think there is "not competition." There is plenty of competition because we have issued 65 more licenses then a City our size is alloted by the State. This has driven the price down. If we issue more licenses the price will go down further. I like to call this economics.

Glad you made it back!

Mike Sylvester

Change Fort Wayne said...

I think we are disagreeing over different things. I meant competition as in when your comments on your blog were referring to competitors for 412 and such.

I do understand the process of obtaining liquor licenses in the state of Indiana.

When I talk about cheap liquor licenses, I am also referring to the cheap licenses obtained by creating special areas, such as RiverFront District. Much like the easily obtainable and cheap Beer/Wine licenses that are available inside of the DID.

I also believe in free market capitalism, thats why I believe that if the bars think the city is playing unfair, they should be able to sell their license on the market and get a fair market value for it. Many times this would be greatly under what they paid for it.

fairplaybeach said...

I made a comment about the 412. I'm not sure if I'm a libertarian or not... but I like to read their views because, for one, they are more likely to have a philosphy.

I don't know the current new owner of the 412. I personally like the 412 just because I'm more likely to run into people I know there. I think all I implied is "Wouldn't it suck for new competition to show up all the sudden with dirt cheap liquor licenses, and not only that... but that some money from taxes they pay is inevitably being used against them?" If you owned the 412 or Henry's or wherever how can you not agree that it would suck?

You mention about the city buying their licenses like they should just willingly give up the fight. I'm not speaking for any bars. I'm just "me" observing. My name's freely exposed on my blog.

I think there have been a lot of good points on both sides about downtown. Right now I'm liking the idea about cutting local small businesses breaks to give them a better chance to succeed and get them to stay and create jobs for the locals. You gotta make things happen yourself at an individual level... If I was in business against some "silver spoons" I'd do everything with every fiber of my being to still succeed, and if the occasion called for it... to f9ck them up... but in reality there's no time for that and they are more likely to screw up on their own...

Anonymous said...

I'm confused. How can a libertarian advocate for less government involvement in private businesses, but complain about city planning?

Wouldn't it be more appropriate to say that planning and zoning should be abolished completely? Granted, that is not what I would advocate, but it would seem more in line with the overall view of less government interference. Why should the government dictate how a private property owner uses his or her property? Let the market decide.

LP Mike Sylvester said...

Anonymous:

You are confused.

Libertarians tend to think our Government is too big and we have too many regulations.

That does not mean that we are anarchists or that we feel there should be no Government.

I think that cities should have zoning and planning Departments. I think those departments should be smaller and easier to deal with then they are in Fort Wayne.

Mike Sylvester

Anonymous said...

Definition of a Libertarian - A person who wants to goverment to be there when it is convenient for them but acts like they want the government to go away. Also wants to control everything the government does but reserves the right to complain about EVERYTHING!

Robert Enders said...

There is a small need for urban planning. For example, businesses should not build fat rendering plants in residential neighborhoods. The noise and smell from the plant would violate the rights of homeowners and tenants living in that neighborhood. Since Libertarians believe that the government's sole job is to protect people's rights, the government would have a duty to tell the business to build the plant elsewhere.