July 19, 2010

Philly Plan

Story in today's paper.  Sounds like the Philly Plan to me.

  • 10 year freeze on assessed value
  • not sure if permitting fees were waived
  • don't need any new water & sewer connections so they do not have to worry about these

1 comment:

JAhn Dough said...

This more insanity by the city.

DO I have it right here?

a. A private property owner bids to provide office space for the DA's office and wins.

b. Private property owner then realizes they significantly under estimated re-hab and tenant fit up costs for a 100+ year old building.

c. Private property owner then comes to the city with their hand out for a property tax subsidy and who knows what else they will want before all is said and done.

Now how would I feel if I was a private property owner who bid on this and lost and I had property that needed little or no work to fit it up for the DA's office space needs. I'll tell you how I would feel...I would feel just like the $50,000 bidder for the Pharmasphere site on SWIP. I would feel the city ++++ed me over by subsidizing another peson private venture.

Meanwhile everyone else taxes go up b/c this real estate dev'er under estimated their costs. Hey let them eat it.

Folks, the DA's office aint leaving downtown Worcester, so this notion (if any) that these subsidies were needed to keep the DA's office downtown is nonsense.