UPDATE: Kim R. is not Ruth R.’s sister, says the anonymous commenter who failed to elucidate at the time of this update.
Before the debate was over I pulled out my computer because the debate was over. I had known Jesse Ramos would be the winner because I’m biased against Tax Increment Financing, but Ponytail Karl was embarrassing himself so badly I had to start writing down my reaction.
The moderator had already shown his own bias by chastising Jesse Ramos for allegedly not answering the question about TIF funding housing in Midtown when Ramos simply reiterated that TIF’s role is to deal with blight, not subsidize housing. After this answer the moderator threatened (semi-jokingly) to not give Jesse back the mic if he wasn’t going to answer the question.
Huh?
Maybe the moderator and Ponytail Karl were rattled by the first question from “table talk” time and the perfect answer Jesse Ramos gave regarding “remittance”. While Karl just stammered about how the board of directors at MRA (Missoula Redevelopment Agency) thought remittance payouts for city budget shortfalls were terrible distractions from their pipeline of projects, Ramos said remittance was the “best tell” that Tax Increment Financing wasn’t working.
Swoosh!
When the next question put Karl on the spot to think creatively about “one thing he would change” about Tax Increment Financing, he freaked out and bid the Mayor to come save him. Yes, Karl, go sit in the cuck chair while Mayor Davis grabs her Harvard strap-on to immediately suggest MORE DEBATE is needed because losing so badly and so quickly clearly required positioning the losers for a rematch in order for more sophisticated bullshit to be developed and deployed.
Hilarious!
When Jesse Ramos got his turn to discuss change he asked if he would get a “phone-a-friend” option like Karl did, then he demonstrated why he didn’t need that option by continuing to wipe the floor with ALL the TIF addicts in the room. And what would Jesse Ramos do to TIF?
Just tie the use of funds to districts with DECLINING property values. If the property value in the TIF isn’t declining, no money. That is a stake to the heart of the slush fund and I love it.
The next question from the table-talkers gave Ponytail Karl a chance to lie about how impossible it was to get a bond passed to extend the life of a TIF district (officially called an “Urban Renewal District”). After that line of bullshit, Jesse Ramos then detailed how TIF District 3 was initially supposed to “sunset” in 2015, but the bond that City Council passed to fund the walking bridge over Reserve Street extended the life of the district to 2040.
Sit the fuck down, Karl!
I want to reemphasize that Karl heads up a board at the Missoula Redevelopment Agency that appears to be very opposed to giving back City Council taxpayer money. For more context on those tight-fisted darlings, here’s a screenshot from the city website:
Before we get to the little more context on Ponytail Karl Englund and why he seemed to adamant about emphasizing following state law, I’d like to point out Ruth Reineking has a sister, a “contractor”, and isn’t that just nice?
After an initial remodel, MNHC moved in and rented the east side as warehouse space in 2005. When the tenant left, MNHC decided to sell the property rather than renovate and lease it.
“It wasn’t in good enough condition to lease for anything but warehouse space. We just decided if we can sell it, we can get the revenue now when we need it and find the right partner,” Olsen said.
The right partner was the Reinekings. Kim Reineking, a contractor, loved the building’s location, too, and thought the two nonprofits might work well together.
The Reinekings bought a portion of the building’s east end from MNHC in 2011 and set up a 20-year lease-to-own agreement with FVLT.
“It’s what we had in mind,” Reineking said of the work so far.
This is almost as nice as getting your daughter a nice job with a developer, right Ellen?
While that kind of stuff happened, Ponytail Karl was swinging his trial lawyer support for a Montana judge involved in one of the most expensive and nasty races for the increasingly politicized Montana Supreme Court:
The race for Montana Supreme Court Justice 2 was between Gustafson, the incumbent, and James Brown, a Helena-based attorney — who declined to do any interviews post-election. Gustafson beat Brown by a margin of about 40,000 votes.
Overall, it was a race that ended up bringing in a lot of out-of-state cash.
“This race was unprecedented in the amount of money that was spent on it, the intensity of the debate about it. It was a pretty nasty race. It at times felt pretty personal and had this really amazing partisan overtone that we’ve never seen in a Supreme Court race before,” University of Montana School of Journalism director Lee Banville said.
While writing posts like this is great and all, it’s still a bit frustrating to have made an entire documentary about the local uprising against TIF in Missoula and, because of my choices to stop playing nice with very corrupt local organizations who play VERY dirty, I literally washed the dishes Monday for an event I should have been attending. Oh well, such is life.
Thanks for reading!
“Before we get to the little more context on Ponytail Karl Englund and why he seemed to adamant about emphasizing following state law, I’d like to point out Ruth Reineking has a sister, a “contractor”, and isn’t that just nice?”
Wait, are you saying that Kim Reineking is Ruth’s sister? LMFAO.
Bud, for someone who does their own research, I think you need to improve your methods. Was this written by seven raccoons in a trenchcoat?
I do make mistakes from time to time, but I do so with my real name. Do you know which one wears the pants the Shocky?
Yes, William Skink wears the lego pants in the blocky cuck chair while Charlie Day pulls red string between thumb tacks on a five valley map while chainsmoking american spirits in the box van. The lego meth nugs roll casually around. A chill is in the air.