IS IT TRUE JULY 24, 2015

1. The Evansville Brownfields Corp is not an Indiana incorported entity? I suspected it was one of those money laundry schemes. Maybe it is an off shore corp. 20 x 150 is an odd size lot. What kind of house or business was formerly there? Surely more to this story?

   • George

     We don’t know. We do know that DMD, ERC and hired professionals left this parcel of land out of the plans to build the parking garage. If Brownfields didn’t purchase this odd size lot for the city they couldn’t have built the parking garage for the Hotel and Medical School.

     We wonder what else DMD and ERC forgot to add to final contraction plans or both projects?

     Signed,
     Editor

2. If Brownfields are not incorporated does that mean the officers will be financially liable for the fiscal irresponsibly and liability’s if the taxpayers don’t bail them out with the up coming 2 plus million appropriation they are going to ask for. O yes they are promising great pie in the sky results with the money but history shows we get about half what is promised. Please block city from funding this organization in the upcoming budget. Everything they are promising to do would be much more efficiently accomplished with existing government and private ownership.

   • George:

     I searched the SOS website this morning and was able to find the listing:

     https://secure.in.gov/sos/online_corps/view_details_ppv.aspx

     I have no idea why the search query I used could not locate it last night. I have been able to find it in the past on the SOS website with no difficulty.

     • So they are a legitimate secret organization that focuses our resources on special interest.

3. The combined sewers are the problem, these storm sewers cause the overflow causing the problems. To transfer the cost to areas not served by surface drainage sewers is wrong . Many areas of the city are served only by sanitary sewers yet have to pay for the few.

4. Who are the Brownfield Board of Directors and who voted against it?

   • JOE

     The Brownfields Corporation Board of Directors are Kelley Coures of the Department of Metropolitan Development, Luke Yeager of Evansville Commerce Bank, Joshua Armstrong of the Chamber of Commerce, local architect and City representative on the hotel project Sara Schuler, Kevin Axsom of FC Tucker Emge Realty, Brad Ellsworth President of Vectren, and City Councilwoman Connie Robinson are on the Board of Directors.

     Connie Robinson was the only one who noted against it.

     Signed,
     Editor

     • Am I the only one who hears alarm bells when I see Brad Ellsworth is a president at Vectren? Looks like a pretty nice payback for something.

5. News Flash . . . remember back in 2008, then Mayor Weinzepfel was strongly considering constructing a north side waste water treatment plant until he engaged some waste water specialists which proved to him that it was an unnecessary project to the disappointment of some local engineering outfits . .price tag was nearly 60 million . . Now, with Santa Lloyd and Christmas Carol at the helm insiders have indicated that after this election, if re-elected, Santa’s workshop room 302 will be dusting over the unnecessary project . . so, my dear Bruce, you better be on the lookout!!!

6. About our only recourse is to try and stop the bleeding. We have seen what Winnecke will do and has done and can neither believe or afford him. We start by getting rid of him. If Gail acts in a similar manner I will be writing the same words about her in 4 years. Any real or perceived similarities between the two is not nearly reason enough to keep Winnecke in office for 1 minute longer than he is statutorily entitled to. He must go.

7. Land Banking……………..Evansville Brownfields

   Evansville Housing Roundtable
   Wednesday, October 26, 2011
   Meeting Minutes
   Room 318, Civic Center Complex, Evansville, Indiana.
   Attendance  Attendance: Mayor Weinzapfel; Ronald Beane, Neighborhood Inspections Services; Thomas Coe, HOPE of Evansville; Chris Cooke, United Neighborhoods of Evansville; Eric Cummings, Crossroads Christian Church & Community One; Monte Fetter, Fetter Properties Management, Inc. President; Luzada Hayes, Aurora; Ron Keeping, Vectren; Ben Miller, Vanderburgh County Building Commission; Bill Pedtke, Southwestern Indiana Builders Association; and Stephanie Tenbarge, ECHO Housing. Also in attendance: DMD Staff –Jane Reel, DMD Deputy Director, Carolyn Rusk, Brownfields Coordinator for DMD and Secretary/Treasurer of Evansville Brownfields Corporation; Skyler York, Community Development Planner for DMD; and Ashten Stenftenagel.
    Special Guests – Gail Riecken, Indiana State Representative; Frank Hagaman, President, Partners in Housing Development Corp.; Andy Fraizer, Executive Director, Indiana Association of Community Economic Development
    Absent: Kevin Bain, Welborn Baptist Foundation, Inc.; Rev. Adrian Brooks, Memorial Community Development Corporation; Cathy Gray, EVSC; Lori Reed, Habitat of Evansville; Daphne Robinson, Evansville Housing Authority; Alice Weathers, CAPE; and Lloyd Winnecke, Vanderburgh Co. Board of Commission. DMD Staff – Thomas Barnett, Executive Director
   Call to Order
   Mayor Weinzapfel called the meeting to order.
   Welcome Guests
   Mayor Weinzapfel welcomed Gail Riecken, Indiana State Representative; Frank Hagaman, President of the Partners in Housing Development Corporation; and Andy Frazier, Executive Director of IACED.
   Land Bank Presentation & Discussion
   Presentation
   Representative Riecken, Mr. Hagaman, and Mr. Frazier gave a presentation which is attached and made part of these minutes.
   Discussion
   Mr. Hagaman stated that the purpose of the land bank will be increasing tax collection, increasing real estate values, and community development.
   Mr. Beane inquired as to whether or not a land bank in the context of this legislation could be a non-profit 501 (c) 3.
   Mr. Hagaman replied that yes, it could be a 501 (c) 3.
   Mr. Frazier stated that it was made clear on a state-wide basis by the Indiana Association for Cities and Towns that land banks can be non-profit, but that they could also still be part of city government.
   Mayor Weinzapfel stated the importance of having the support of the City for these projects.

   • That is one “Round table meeting in the open” I searched but did not find any more before or after. I am assuming that at that point in time the powers that be liked the government funded secret EBC. If you are wondering what happened to all the CDBG funding received in the last ten years that would be a good place to look. Now that they can not continue to use the CDBG funds to maintain their expensive lifestyle and stock of properties they want a local 2+ million bailout.

8. From what I understand: The Brownfields started by taking CDBG funds (our tax dollars) and started entered the real-estate business. Now they have an accumulation of property they cannot afford to maintain. The city is paying the maintenance cost of their inventory.

   In January they sold a property for $35,000 (I think). Where did that money go?

   • The focus, ever since Tom Barnett did his survey of substandard housing in Evansville, has been to raze as many properties as possible. If you have to use code enforcement as a means to price them out of their homes, so be it.

     They now have a problem with coming up with the funds for the cost of razing a structures. They would like to do more of them annually. I do not see where hiring someone with a track hoe and a dump truck should be that expensive. If so, why doesn’t EBC hire one as a permanent employee? Some one is probably getting fat off of the razing contracts. There is also a lot of legal work involved with snatching and demolishing someone’s home, and no one has investigated the players in that segment of this business.

     • It is a giant problem. Barnett told me straight to my face that there are 10,000 homes in Evansville that are in need of $100,000 or more of work to be habitable. On the other hand they can be torn down for $5,000 each. So Evansville minimally has a blight problem that will cost $50 Million to demolish and then $3 M per year to keep mowed. What has been done thusfar is not even the tip of the tip of the iceberg.

     • Press, my take on it is that they use code enforcement only when there is a desired property that fits into their special plan. The rest of the houses can fall down and they don’t care. Code enforcement for the benefit of a few special plans rather than the neighborhoods. From my perspective they need to raze more. Houses have to fall down to be put on the list. I proposed a house on Egmont that is just a burnt shell back in march for the Blight Elimination Program (BEP). Neighbors say its been burnt for 3 years now.

       That title issue is something else I don’t understand. Why worry about title if your just tearing it down. Start worrying about the title when you have a buyer and a project. Why do you need more than a quit claim deed if the lot is for a driveway or yard. If someone shows up wanting it – give them the bill for demolition.

     • Like most posters on this blog you have no idea what you’re talking about. Those contracts to raze buildings are won by being barely above costs. Whoever wins is strictly turning dollars period.

       • You, you disgusting piece of crap once we ran your balance it became apparent why you’d post up some rotten pompous crap like that. Useless jerk, and your failed project balance speaks for itself. “Teats of the public” served you some, however the end results are left over sh– just like your so called engineering. go away, far away you old dried up puke.

9. Perhaps they should change the name to Greenfields the way they blow through taxpayers money.

10. DOWNTOWN HOTEL: The numbers we need to see . . .

    How much will Hunt Construction be paid to be the Construction Manager for this project ? These guys were paid $ 8 Million to build the Fraud Center, with some really questionable bonuses paid for things like minority participation, ‘on-time completion’ (able to host an event, yet no event held), local contractors utilized, etc.

    Second, what is the precise deal ONB has re: its “investment” of $ 8-12 Million ? Interest received, participate in sale of the property down the road, etc.; and how does that compare to the deal the citizens have for their $ 20 Million ???

11. Another day, another tea party member goes on a rampage with a gun. It’s pretty scary. The guy made blog posts which sound like half the crazies around here.

    • Show us where it says he’s a tea partier – usually they’re muslims.

    • To the contrary, Baghdad Bob, he seems to have been a typical dem. Mentally incompetent.
      But to humor you, what evidence do you have he was a tea party member?

      • It’s all over credible news sources that he was in fact a ‘bagger. He made posts similar to you quite frequently.

        • And your “credible news source” saying he belonged to the tea party is?

          • It also concerns me that you could be the next to snap. These are scary times with thousands of armed nuts who are hell bent on blaming Obama for any problem in his or her life. Face it, Obama could cure cancer and fart golden eggs and you’d still sit in your trailer seething with anger and hatred whilst smoking a pall mall and sipping on a Busch heavy.

          • Since you’re too lazy to look, here you go. This is even from a conservative Web site. Face it, he was a right wing lunatic just like you.

            On second thought I can’t get the link to post on this cell phone. I guess you’ll have to take 2 seconds and look it up.

12. Gee Baghdad, all I asked was a simple question. Who’s your credible news source. If you’re ashamed of it tell me this. Exactly what did they say about the killer being a tea party member?

13. On the Progress and Present State of Political
    Representation.

    THE subject of the following Treatise is daily becoming of higher importance. The successful operation of representative governments as exhibited in England, and in a still more striking manner in the United States of America, promises to lead in the course of time to the establishment of the same system in other countries,
    where at present the will of the monarch, instead of being under the salutary influence of constitutional checks, is irregularly controlled by variable views of private benefit, or apprehensions of personal danger.

    The system of political representation, now matured into admirable usefulness, was not the offspring of any comprehensive policy, but simply of the exigencies of the time in which it arose. It was called into action, in its first rude shape, by those in power, because it appeared to them the readiest and least troublesome mode of raising pecuniary supplies ; and it was continued for a long period with the same design. In England, the first deputies sent from the boroughs, at the summons of the crown, were assembled together, because it was easier for the government to treat with them as a body, than to negotiate separately with the agents of every borough for the supplies which were wanted. The sole business of these deputies, this rudiment of a House of Commons, appears originally to have been to hear the proposals of the king and council regarding the subsidies required from the people ; and after due deliberation, and perhaps demurs on one part and con- cessions and modifications on the other, to give their consent to the taxes to be imposed. It was
    a very natural step for the deputies to avail themselves of the opportunity of being thus assembled together at the seat of government, to complain of any injuries which the people were suffering, or to petition for any privileges which their constituents were anxious to possess.

    These petitions when granted, seem gradually to have acquired the character of laws ; and it is easy to conceive how the deputies, thus rising into importance, were transformed from mere agents, whose office was limited to the negotiation of pecuniary levies, into legislators, whose business it was to attend to the general welfare of the people. One after another, every measure which affected the state was comprehended in their deliberations, and brought within the vortex of their power ; not, however, without continual struggles on the part of the monarch, struggles rendered ultimately ineffectual by the tenacity of the Commons in grasping the exclusive privilege of granting or withholding those pecuniary supplies, without which all governments are helpless.

    The instinct of power in the executive during these successive struggles, in which it became more and more manifest how vain it was to expect success in an open contention with the Commons, soon prompted a recourse to the arts of corruption, by which, for a long period, the authority of the crown was upheld against the just claims of the people. The supplies which the Lower House, as a body, tenaciously held it to be their peculiar privilege to grant, were employed, either directly or circuitously, in seducing the individual members to grant them in the desirable profusion. Throughout all these changes, if we attentively observe them, we may see the operation of different interests gradually raising the system of representation into greater and greater importance, till at length it has confessedly become the main principle of the British government. ” Whatever else may be said of the House of Commons, this one point at least is indisputable, that, from the earliest infancy of the constitution, the power of the House of Commons has been growing, till it has almost,
    like the rod of Aaron, absorbed its fellows *.”

    While looking, however, at the changes in the relative position and power of the representative body and the executive authority, we must not forget to mark the action of the legislative assembly on the people, and of the people on the assembly. At first, the representatives felt them- selves completely identified with their constitu- ents; being sent to the seat of government for short periods, not to legislate, but to transact matters of business formerly done at home. In the course of events, as business multiplied on their hands, their absence . was protracted ; by being longer together, they became more united in feeling, and more important as a body ;
    and thus acquiring distinct sympathies and interests of their own, they were insensibly separated
    from the people. As they rose into greater consideration with the monarch and the nobility, and began to feel the growing importance with all classes, conferred by growing power, they were naturally led to regard a seat in the legislature as desirable in itself; and instead of shrinking from the trouble attendant upon it, as was the case at the outset, they eagerly sought the distinction which the office bestowed. Meanwhile, from various circumstances, the power of appointing to a seat, virtually passed from the people into the hands of the aristocracy; and the direct responsibility formerly existing, dwindled to a mere phantom. Hence the House of Commons became still more separated in feeling and interest from the great mass of the nation; acquired the haughtiness of a privileged independent body; deliberated with closed doors; would not admit their debates to be divulged ; assumed the airs and state of an uncontrolled authority ; and would have probably shaken off all semblance of accountability, had it not been that a connection with the people was necessary for that power
    over the supplies, which constituted their own importance with the crown.

    The people, however, were not inactive on their part. As they grew in numbers and wealth, they began to perceive how deeply their welfare was implicated in the measures of the Parliament: they became curious after its proceedings; found means of gratifying their curiosity ; forced themselves into the two houses ; established their own reporters there, in defiance of antiquated regulations ; and thus brought the whole legislature under the control of public opinion. Nor while doing this, could they be insensible of the gross defects and inequalities of the system of representation which had thus fortuitously resulted from the operation of so many interests working without any common plan or principle. The necessity of a change, long felt by reflecting men, became more and more conspicuous to the nation. It was at this stage that the American
    Revolution brought the whole subject of political representation into public discussion; not discussion in schools, or amongst mere closet-philosophers, but amongst men who had to set vigorously to work, to form institutions for their own protection and happiness. Casting aside the narrow views in which the system had originated, and which had continued to modify it with a prejudicial influence, they considered political representation as the only means of self- government that could be resorted to by an extensive community, and as best adapted to effect those objects, which all government ought to contemplate. A comprehensive survey of the subject was thus at last taken, and, what is still more, was acted upon. The system was consi- dered, as all systems of action ought to be, in relation to the object which it had to accomplish.

    In our own country, a long and vehement opposition was made to the introduction of improvements, which good sense had for many years weaned itself in pointing out, and which experience in another country had shown to be practicable and salutary. The people at last triumphed : the grossest and most glaring in- equalities and absurdities were got rid of; and, to the disappointment of many gloomy anticipations, the sun of British prosperity continued to shine, notwithstanding the political extermination of Sarum and Gatton.

    It is a remark which forces itself on, every reflecting mind, that, during the whole career of the representative system in England, from the time when the boroughs were first required to send deputies to the grand council of the nation down to the introduction of the Reform Bill by Lord Grey’s administration, whatever changes took place in this part of the constitution, were fundamentally owing to that alteration in the relative position of different classes of the community, which was produced by the progress of wealth and civilization, and to the struggle of interests mainly caused by that progress.

    • That last paragraph is quite instructive. I quote: ” …whatever changes took place in this part of the constitution, were fundamentally owing to that alteration in the relative position of different classes of the community, which was produced by the progress of wealth and civilization, and to the struggle of interests mainly caused by that progress.”

      I would say our country, the United States of America, is following a well trodden path in a process that has led to the “progress of wealth and civilization” for at least 200 years. There have been bumps in that road, and some corrections were necessary, however, the journey continues and some times I wonder if it is the political system that needs adjusting, or is it the hearts of man that need the adjusting? When the two are aligned great things can happen.

14. The Illinois Senate voted 38 to 20 Sunday for a bill that would reduce Chicago’s payments over the next five years in a move meant to relieve immediate pressure, though it doesn’t address the city’s risk of insolvency from $20 billion in unfunded pension liabilities.

    * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

    Richard J. Daley, Chicago Mayor, 1955-1976, Democrat

    Richard M. Daley, Chicago Mayor, 1989-2011, Democrat

    The father and son had a total of 43 years in office as Mayor of Chicago. Their legacy is a bankrupted city and state.

15. INDIANA PAYING $71. MILLION MORE ON LUCAS OIL STADIUM DEBT

    http://www.ibj.com/articles/print/53247-indiana-paying-71m-more-on-lucas-oil-stadium-debt

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