IS IT TRUE JUNE 14, 2017

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IS IT TRUE that we wonder if the dogmatic pursuit of the excessive taxation of obsolete printing equipment in the possession of the Evansville Courier and Press by Vanderburgh County Assessor office ultimately led Gannett to move the printing operation to Louisville?…this is just the sort of thing that drives companies to pack their bags and head across the money saving bridge to some state that does not rake them over the coals for taxes on something that is gathering dust and has very little value?…there should be some sanity check to taxing property other than having someone in the assessor’s office who doesn’t know a printing press from a yo-yo assigning an arbitrary value to something they know very little about?…now that all is said and done, all of those jobs associated with printing the Courier and Press have moved across the river? …we predict that Vanderburgh County Assessor Bill Fluty (R) will have an extremely qualified Democratic opponent in the next General election?

IS IT TRUE Reckitt Benckiser Group announced that it has received final regulatory approval to acquire Mead Johnson Nutrition that has operated a manufacturing plant in Evansville for the last 102 years?…the deal is expected to close this Thursday?…it was about 6 years ago that Mead Johnson left the friendly confines of Evansville to move their headquarters to Chicago?…MJ has about 950 employees in Evansville who earn $85 million in wages and $30 million in benefits with nearly 100 holding advanced degrees?…we hope that the Vanderburgh County Assessor’s Office does not run this good business out of town by taxing dust gathering equipment as though it was golden?

IS IT TRUE that the saga of the downtrodden folks who are fearful of losing their subsidized housing continues with Mayor Winnecke’s political proclamation that he feels their pain?…it makes one wonder how someone who grew up in a middle class home without having experienced things like little food on the table, utilities shut off, health care insecurity and the threat of eviction from your home could really feel such pain?…Mayor Winnecke, like many Americans has lived a fairly comfortable middle class life and living in a nice home growing up, received his education at a private University, and a career path with very few pitfalls? …communication is truly what Mayor Winnecke is very good at but it must be pointed out that words do not pay the rent, utilities bills, provide basic health care, provide warn clothing for their kids or put groceries in the refrigerator?

IS IT TRUE it is unfortunate that Evansville has people who have been living a subsidized life so long that living without adequate subsidies for food, housing, clothing and medical care that instills fear in their psyches?…we hope that these people do find a way to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps and escape the bondage of dependence?…we also understand that it is these people and not a person of privilege  that really know the fear of homelessness and an empty stomach?

IS IT TRUE it was recently announced that the KIDS FREEDOM PARK play ground located at Sunset Park will be moved to make way for a City of Evansville waste water pump station project?  …we highly recommend that the City of Evansville Water and Sewer Utilities folks check the land deed to see if they can use the soon to be vacated land for a water and sewer pump station project?  …we have been told that deed to this property clearly states that this land can only be used as a city park?  …we recommend that city check the deed to this property before building something on it?

IS IT TRUE we have been told that the City of Evansville design of $18 million dollar upgrade to the North Main street area may have an expensive repair issue facing them?  …we are hearing that the design work concerning the road width may be to narrow for delivery trucks to use?

Todays “READERS POLL” question is:  Do you feel that individuals in the Vanderburgh County Assessors office sometimes assigns an arbitrary value to something they know very little about?

We urge you to take time and click the section we have reserved for the daily recaps of the activities of our local Law Enforcement professionals. This section is located on the upper right side of our publication.

If you would like to advertise or submit and article in the CCO please contact us City-County Observer@live.com

 EDITORS FOOTNOTE:  Any comments posted in this column doesn’t represents the views or opinions of our advertisers.

 

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32 COMMENTS

  1. Is it true when they built the new train display at the museum it was put right over one of the largest oldest water lines in the city?

  2. TAX ABATEMENT

    This is the usual picture of abatement here in Evansville.

    https://www.plasticstoday.com/content/berry-plastics-spend-31-million-new-infrastructure-and-equipment/99742137819886

    This article does not even mention the $22. Million economic development bond that Berry got the City of Evansville to issue, and then promptly bought the entire bond themselves! I am still trying to figure that one out.

    We have posted the list of companies in Vanderburgh County that receive personal property tax abatement and it covers most of the major business operating here. A 7 to 10 year abatement is the norm, and by the time the abatement runs out the machinery has usually reached the lowest rate at which it will be taxed from that point on.

    If one were to look at the “incentives” that the Evansville Courier&Press was able to take advantage of when they moved to the Walnut Industrial Park location and couple that with the personal property tax abatement they also received at that time, I think you might think them generous enough.

    When it comes to paying for this institution we call local government one thing is clear: when you have more people sitting in the wagon than you have pulling the wagon, the wagon stops moving.

    My own personal feeling about the local newspaper unused printing press is that it is not quite the same as say, Van Gogh losing his paint brush.

    • “When it comes to paying for this institution we call local government one thing is clear: when you have more people sitting in the wagon than you have pulling the wagon, the wagon stops moving.”

      Classic

  3. “when you have more people sitting in the wagon than you have pulling the wagon, the wagon stops moving”…………….right on…………right on…….Press………the exact reason Mr.Trump was elected President……..by working hard middle America……………

  4. The unhinged nut job that wanted to shoot as many Repbulicans as he could this morning, was a known Bernie Sanders supporter that had referred to Trump as traitor.

    http://theweek.com/speedreads/705715/baseball-gunman-reportedly-identified-james-t-hodgkinson-illinois

    Unfortunately the violence of the leftists seen in California during the campaign, and the celebrities wishing Trump dead, likely helped motivate today’s sad sneak attack. Let’s tone down the rhetoric and name calling, so no other nut job feels compelled to act out. If you don’t like Trump and Republicans, just be civil.

    • I wonder if some of the celebrity rhetoric could be deemed as inciting attempted murder?

      • Joe I blame the Fake MSM………….for inciting their batshit crazy lunitic fringe subscribers……….

      • Joe Wallace, here are 15 examples of celebrity actions that could easily incite violence. Since the unhinged often think celebrities are sending them overt or secret messages, it creates a very dangerous situation. If the unhinged think they will be famous, please their celebrity soulmate or are acting out what they were secretly directed to do, yes it could be inciting a crime. Reality check, If we pulled any of this when Obama was President, we’d still be in the Fed. penitentiary. Now, its the new norm of the leftists, Republicans don’t just have bad ideas, they are evil peole. Very sad for America.

        l ……………………

        But the level of vitriol and violent rhetoric against now-President Trump has increased substantially in recent weeks, from comedian Kathy Griffin’s now-famous shock “beheading” photograph to Shakespeare in the Park’s not-at-all-subtle “assassination” of Trump on a stage in New York City’s Central Park.

        Unfortunately, Griffin and the director of Julius Caesar are not anomalies in Hollywood; actors, writers, directors, and other celebrities have fantasized about using violence against Trump, his supporters, and other GOP lawmakers for at least the past 18 months.

        http://www.breitbart.com/big-hollywood/2017/06/14/15-times-celebrities-envisioned-violence-against-trump-and-the-gop/

    • As long as we continue to gleefully place blame on anybody EXCEPT the trigger-puller (with the not even subtle intent of burnishing how pure and noble our own particular set of beliefs are), we are going to be in a perpetual cycle of this type of action.

      It isn’t Bernie Sanders fault…
      It isn’t Trump’s fault…
      It isn’t the gun’s fault…
      It isn’t the fringe media’s fault…
      It isn’t the mainstream media’s fault…
      It isn’t the police department’s fault…
      It isn’t the fault of idiot celebrity’s…
      It isn’t the fault of global warming…
      It isn’t the church’s fault…
      Etc…

      It’s the fault of the criminal who pulled the trigger, and his alone.

      • That is Today’s MSM in a nutshell to their lunitic fringe………It Is All Trumps Fault…………

      • So the Chicago murder rate is without a doubt the criminal not the government lack of enforcing the laws…………………..

        • Indeed, although I suspect you might be trying to be a smart-aleck… 🙂

          Lack of enforcement doesn’t cause people to commit crime any more than enforcement causes people to NOT commit crime. As an example, possessing personal use amounts of marijuana is de facto legal in most states this point. The fact that the federal or state law against possession is not really being enforced hasn’t caused me to start smoking weed. Likewise, you will go to jail for a LONG TIME if you get busted with a couple of pounds of meth. However, the threat of enforcement has done essentially nothing to stop the meth epidemic.

          Haters are gonna hate and killers are gonna kill. One of the political right’s main arguments against ‘gun control’ is that criminals aren’t going to follow the law, so making gun laws stricter isn’t going to do anything to stop gun crime. Same basic tenet.

  5. right on………right on Joe…………….the left has without a doubt gone batshit crazy over President Trump…………the left had all their liberal polls and media saying no way Trump will win…………..now the left and their commie media have been for going on for close to a year told their batshit crazy sheep that President Trump will be impeached…….Mr.Trump will Not be impeached………..so the batshit crazy liberal sheep will go farther and farther off the rails when the Russia scam is closed…………God Bless President Trump And His Family…………

    • Trump won’t be impeached by the Dems. He’s too much of a gift to the Democrats and liberals. But the GOP is gonna have to face down Trump ethics violations, collusion with foreign governments and cover-up errors. The Republican Party may have no choice but to impeach. It won’t be the MSM’s fault. It’ll be the fault of a reality TV star in the Whitehouse who isn’t up to the job. He craves attention. Governing and change is the last thing on his mind. Major weakness this need to crave attention. It’s beneficial in getting first-time votes…and a quality that is a hilarious disaster as the chief executive.

      The 33% of the country that will excuse Trump for anything, anything at all including turning into LIBERALS…I see they herd together in here. Just type in MOOOOO on your CCO replies, or whatever sound mindless, follow the crowd dumb Water Buffalo herds make. Mindless herd members: Al Sharpie, the Indiana Enoch and JoeBiden. You guys HOPE this crap goes away. It AIN’T going away. It’s gonna go on for FOUR FREAKIN’ YEARS.

      (BTW – Trump has done nothing. Executive orders can be overturned overnight. And SCOTUS’ Gorsuch was Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s gift to the Republican Party. Mitch McConnell did that back in early 2016.)

      • See my above comment………..the left has gone without a doubt batshit crazy……….oneeville just proved my point……..blah blah blah..complete nonsense………

        • Al, what kind of dumb ass crap is this? It’s not the LEFT you need to be worried about. But the whole Trump herd is totally unschooled. Why not just use two letters: M-OOOOOOOO.

          And i notice, you protest too loudly and too strongly. You are right to be worried Sir.

  6. “…it makes one wonder how someone who grew up in a middle class home without having experienced things like little food on the table, utilities shut off, health care insecurity and the threat of eviction from your home could really feel such pain?…”

    Probably a little unfair, Editor. I don’t know that you have to have directly experienced something to genuinely empathize with what another person is going through. I’ve never had a fire at my house, but that doesn’t prevent me from thinking about the terror and sense of loss that an event like that must cause. I’ve never left a job involuntarily, but I can imagine the sense of helplessness and hopelessness it instills in a person who HAS been let go. Disagree with his politics/policies or not, I’ve never gotten the impression from our Mayor that he is callous or insincere in his attempts to help those residents of Evansville who are struggling. Misguided, maybe, but not insincere.

    As an aside, being raised in a decent, stable, middle class household by parents who give a shit didn’t use to = a silver spoon upbringing, but maybe by today’s definition it does. If so, that’s a pretty wretched indictment of our current societal expectations.

    • This is America we all have ups and downs …………….drugs and welfare have without a doubt became a life choice to 30% of our population………time to cut them off…………….get rid of gubmint payments people will without a doubt starve or get a job………….their Choice………

  7. I’m going to make a single commentary on this (I hope) and then I am going to try and not get too focused on what happened today yet. What happened this morning was a tragedy that will need time to investigate and explain, but I am VERY pissed off at how the right-wing is already using this as a political hammer with almost zero information released by law enforcement.

    “I’m really not that interested to tell you the truth”

    This is the comment of Republican Steve King from Iowa, who could not wait to start encouraging more hate among Americans by blaming politics and Democrats before any investigation has been done.

    Mark Walker, Republican Representative from North Caroline, said that the shooter “obviously planned to kill many Republican members” in a remarkably ignorant comment with zero facts to prove anything was “obvious”

    This is the crap that fosters the hate and violence we see in America more and more. Making the statement that a member of Congress is “not interested” in telling the truth is repugnant and reprehensible. The Republicans and right-wing are already jumping for joy that this horrific tragedy has been linked to someone who has volunteered for a Democratic candidate in 2016. When did America become so hate filled that politicians in Washington and Congress use a tragedy to promote their abhorrent and revolting ideas?

    Very little, almost a minuscule amount, of information has been obtained by law enforcement investigators, yet this bombastic glory hog is already making pronouncements about how this is all the fault of a Democrat.

    “America has been divided, and the violence is appearing in the streets, and it’s coming from the left”

    Really? That is the most repulsive comment I can imagine from a Republican who is known for being vile and hateful, and someone who has a history of promoting violence against others.

    If King wants to talk about a “divided America” maybe he should book a flight to Florida on the one-year anniversary of the Pulse nightclub shooting, the deadliest shooting in the history of America, and try and justify his hate and division. He can go to Charleston so he can take the pulpit of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, and then go and explain it to each of the families of the Sandy Hook children and teachers, how this is all the fault of the left.

    He can go tell it to the families of the people shot at Virginia Tech, and at the movie theater in Aurora, and at the Safeway in Tucson, and at the Sikh Temple in Wisconsin, and at UC Santa Barbara, and at the Washington Navy Yard and at Fort Hood (twice) how those politics of the left are the cause of what happened today, even though he has ZILCH for proof.

    King is the poster child for the disgusting, offensive, objectionable, vile, foul, nasty, loathsome, sickening, nauseating, hateful, detestable, execrable, abominable, monstrous, appalling, insufferable, intolerable, unacceptable, contemptible, unsavory, and unpalatable behavior that has been descending on America more and more in the age of Trump, and for him to blame Democrats to exploit a tragedy during a time when we get daily examples of a “divided America” under Trump is not something I can stomach. King makes me physically and mentally sick.

    Political polarization is more common among conservatives than liberals, and the exaggerations and falsehoods emanating from right-wing media outlets have infected mainstream discourse. What’s at issue here is not just asymmetrical polarization but asymmetrical news consumption. The left avail themselves of real journalism, however flawed it may be, while the right gorges on what is essentially political propaganda, all the while denigrating anything that contradicts their worldview as “fake news”

    Bottom Line: If you think that what King did today by manipulating a tragedy to capitalize for his political benefit, for him to clearly try and profit from a shocking event where people were injured and killed, then you should look in the mirror as being “part of the problem, not part of the solution”

    http://bit.ly/KingIsPartOfProblem

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