Let’s see. I was babbling along, talking about all these Freedom of Information Act requests. I was waiting for some answers. I was wondering some things about those contracts, which you can download over on the right side of this screen.
And then everything went quiet. People stopped commenting.
Maybe the time for talking is over.
Maybe we’ve heard enough.
Maybe we have no more questions, because we’ve figured out the answers.
Now the question is: What action shall we choose to take?
June 28, 2009 at 6:51 pm
Alice, I think I have good idea of where we are now, some idea of how we got here, and a much better view of the direction I would like to see the county go. I don’t think the current BOS is capable of going where I want to see the county go. I see improvement coming through the careful replacement of Board positions as they come up. In order for the citizens to make good decisions, they need to be informed with facts. Some of the facts I would like to see presented in advance of any Board member selection is individual qualifications. These could be in separate categories such as educational background, prior civic service, and factors that reflect maturity as well as a variety of morals and ethics. Beliefs and vision are important as well. I would like to know if someone sees the future of flying cars as the reason to support co-signing for airport improvements. An important factor is ones commitment to take whatever steps are necessary to do the job well. It is a crime to me that the Board members are often in the position of not having time, or are not willing make time, to seek multiple opinions or suggestions. Instead they must take the word of a few “enlightened” individuals. I want someone who is willing to put an issue on hold and spend evenings calling and asking for comments. Or setting up meetings and asking District members what they think before they decide. I would like to know how one plans to handle this decision making process before placing my vote. Giving the job its moneys worth is not good enough. I want someone who is not working for the money or prestige, but desires to do the job well as the most important factor. Don’t think of, “they don’t pay enough”. I want someone who is driven to do the job well regardless. We already have a record of how the current Board members handle this issue.
Another concern is how do you get this information out the voters? Perhaps it is too early to put out information now, but some plan has to be established to do so. It must be presented in an honest way, without being spun by the media. I don’t have the experience to know how. I do know that once there are a couple of Board members who see things the right way, they can use their positions to help lever like minded people when they come up for future elections. The first couple of seats will be the most difficult and the most important. Okay, I have thrown my gallon of gas on the fire!
June 26, 2009 at 7:51 pm
Red, Alice, and everyone, we need to slow down here. Requests were made under FOIA and we need to wait for the answers to our questions before we do anything else, including speculating about what might be, and what we might do, until more is known.
If it is a done deal and there is no ‘out’ clause on the balance of the purchase ($6.5MM), there is no option other than to pay the note, assuming it was properly executed and no public hearing was required prior to its issuance.
We may not be paying one penny more than $6.5MM on the note, plus interest, but as of now we have no idea where additional funds will come from to pay for turning the farm into an industrial park, other than the $700K that had to collateralize the water project on the property. What else might be lurking out there, and who will pay? Right now, we don’t know. But the information has been requested.
The financing documentation itself says that in the event of a default the land will be sold to satisfy any outstanding balance at the time of default. It does not specify what would happen should the sale of the land not satisfy the amount of the obligation, and that is one concern I have. It DOES specify that ‘we’ will pay her legal fees, though. So I’m not clear on the claim about ‘no recourse.’
The other concern I have is the sources of revenue that will be used to pay this note, approved by the Board. And so I have requested documentation that will provide these answers.
I take serious exception to the claim that lawyers who are party to this deal would not be capable of making mistakes. A big fat blooper got by one of them concerning this deal, but was undone and at least for the time being I believe it is meaningless other than to prove the points that have been made over and over and over on this blog.
The tax free issue IS an issue for the county / EDA. The EDA operates under the Industrial Development and Revenue Act, and there are clauses in that Act which appear to apply, …but we won’t know until we receive the information requested.
There may not be anything ‘hinky’ at all in this deal. It may be brilliantly supported by outstanding documentation that supports the purchase price of $7.5MM dollars – and more importantly, where the money will come from to pay for it. Plus specify who is ultimately responsible for payment. We don’t know yet. What we do know is land has been bought by this county / EDA at seriously off market prices, at a time when national and international economic indicators are screaming that we are hurling off a precipice. But since it’s true that the only thing we have propping us up is warfare and national security, it just may be that all of the government agencies and war equipment manufacturers that PTS has done business with in the past, will set up shop out here, too, making $7.5MM look like a STEAL. We just don’t know yet, and have to wait for the information requested before speculating any further.
We DO know what PTS’s revenues were from government contracts from 2000-2009. It’s public information. And we DO know the amount of tax revenue expected from them when they are fully operational on their 15 acres. We also know that the first payment is due in 6 months and it is $378 thousand.
Let’s wait until the picture is more complete. I have 7 more days on an FOIA request to run through because the attorney for the deal is out of town, so we’ll know more soon.
June 26, 2009 at 5:05 pm
The simplicity of the Red Stapler icon in the movie “Office Space” and its relationship with the man who solved everyone’s problem in that movie is representative in the statements made here by Mr Red Stapler.
Tell those higher in the food chain how you feel about the stupid land deal and make him square this up. Cantor has made many statements to the effect that he is against this sort of waste. Time to put your money where your mouth is Honorable Sir.
http://cantor.house.gov/contact.htm
Tell the man how you feel and that you vote how you feel about him. Bam.
These guys too:
webb.senate.gov/contact/
warner.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?p=Contact
Speak clearly and use small words.
BM
June 26, 2009 at 6:20 pm
Everybody needs to do this. We’re all in this together. Also Obenshain and Gilbert. And Lesinski, who is running against Gilbert, and likes to issue press releases about what he would do differently from Gilbert.
My informal poll says 58 out of 65 voters in Page County object to this contract.
Feel free to post more ideas and comments. And to take actions and coordinate actions.
Next steps are in process. Add more ideas as the process continues.
Is anybody out there a contract lawyer? We’ll need to re-negotiate.
June 26, 2009 at 2:58 pm
Keep up the fight, let the banks, the TV, especialy the USDA representatives, know that the people of Page DO NOT WANT THIS LOAN.Let your congressmen know we DO NOT WANT THIS LOAN. If your congressmen hear enough noise they can very well influence USDA or any other government agency. THATS WHAT THEY DO. THATS WHY YOU ELECTED THEM.
I have already sent Mark Obenshain and other government types a letter letting him know WE, THE PEOPLE OF PAGE, DO NOT WANT THIS LOAN. Jim Turner should be sending copies of the petition to all our local and federal reresentatives, along with any newspaper articals. RAISE HELL. If you can stop the loan, the re negotiation of the note will go a whole lot easier.
June 26, 2009 at 3:24 pm
Good advice.
Anybody out there have a competing viewpoint, before I push the button?
June 26, 2009 at 12:34 pm
First off, this is a done deal. The only thing left is to pay off the note or not. The release clause is standard stuff. you always pay more that 100% of the per acre cost in this type of deal. The main thing is there is language in the note that says all payments …”are applied first to interest and then to principle..” The priciple on the note is 6.5M. That’s it.
We are not paying one penny more. IT’S IN THE NOTE! IT’S DONE ALL THE TIME. THIS IS NOTHING NEW!
Second, there were too many lawyers involved that would in no way risk their license to practice if there were anything funny going on with this deal.
Third, at the time the deal was made, there may have been factors influencing the board that we don’t know about.
Fourth, was it a good deal? It was for the seller! If I were still in the land development business, I would have made a much differant deal from a buyers standpoint. I would have used options to buy the propery, not cash. After all, there was no other competition for the land. Who else would the seller have dealt with? No one!
Fifth, the issue of the tax free interest is the sellers business and no one else’s. The docments state she had got an opinion from a group of tax lawyers that her interest may be tax exempt. It’s her business. She will still be hit with the Alternative Minimum Tax, so she will still pay quite a bit of tax on the money. Again, it ain’t nobodys else’s business.
Sixth, if you insist on continuing to try to dig up something hinky in this deal, keep close track of the hours and money you spend. When you get done, you will have a accurate accounting of all the time and money you have wasted.
Seventh, the thing to do now is move forward and try to stop the bleeding of taxpayers money on this deal. The first thing that should be done RIGHT NOW is parcel out the 30 or so acres the county is due from the initial downpayment. The second thing to do is either go back to the seller and re negotiate the note or walk away from the deal. If the county could get the interest rate adjusted down to a minimum, say 1% per year, the money paid (around 65K per year) might well be worth it to have the land available if something came along. The due date on the note needs to be extended also. Say 5 years. Maybe with a five year extension of note in those years the economy will heal and we can make something work out with the land.
If the seller will not re negotiate, get the 30 acres and WALK AWAY. It is a NON RECOURSE NOTE (hell, you can’t beat that with a stick). There’s nothing the seller can do but get her land back through the leagl process. Worried about what the bonding company would do? They ain’t gonna due anything, once again, IT’S A NON RECOURSE NOTE. There’s not going to be any lawsuite or anything else. There’s no legal ground for the seller to stand on. Anyway, why would the seller sue, when down the road their only viable purchaser might just as well be the County?
Keep up the petition, keep hounding your representatives in a polite fashion. Keep making noise.
Oh and lastly, be glad you live in a country where you’re not being shot at while doing this!
June 26, 2009 at 1:00 pm
But, Red, that’s it! That’s the answer! What you just said!
The Board keeps saying they’re getting a loan to pay her off before Jan 1, 2010. THAT’s what we’re worried about, that they’ll get a real loan with a real bank that we won’t be able to get out of!
I just had a very long conversation with Dr. Tom Cardman. He said they were 99.9% sure they were going to get a loan to pay this off before Jan 1, 2010 when the first payment is due. Tom LaFrance also said that. But the strange thing is, when I put in a FOIA request for their loan applications, all I got was some odd looking document from January 2009 that didn’t appear to have the words “loan” on them.
What we want is for the Board to take their 38.67 acres and opt out of the rest of it, like Mark Belton said we could do when he had the public hearing on the “budget transfer to the EDA”. The problem is that instead of trying to figure that out, the Board is rushing ahead with a $700K letter of credit to put water and sewer onto the PTS property, which we will owe back to the state if PTS doesn’t open a data center that brings at least 25 new jobs.
It isn’t we who said it would ruin the county’s credit — it’s Mrs. Strickler and Dr. Cardman who said that. We’re just saying, “Hey, why are you saying that? Are you hiding something else?”
So you’ve got the solution. There it is. I’m rushing off to write up a resolution and propose that the Board do that. I’d attribute it to you, but I’m not sure if “Red Stapler” works in that context.
Oh, and lastly, I’m very glad to be an American. Doing this is my duty as a citizen. I hope everyone will join me in participating in good government, which is open government.
All opinions and viewpoints count, and expressing them from all their aspects is what brings us to good answers.
June 26, 2009 at 12:46 am
No, we don’t have the answers yet. But we have asked the questions. I feel certain there is a lot of anticipation ‘out there.’ And I feel equally certain we will encounter `A Riddle Wrapped in a Mystery Inside an Enigma’. Winston S. Churchill, October 1, 1939. We already are.