[Updated 1/13/18 to add bold quote in 4th box down]
"I
think downtown should be looked at first."
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"Scott
needs this for his board and help build consensus on a site
option ... we need to know if we can make case for a downtown
site and in the process include it as part of the URF stragegy"
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"Scott
sent me an email and made it clear that he has to evaluate sites
and cannot automatically go to a downtown site without having
looked at other sites"
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"We need to make sure that [Director of Upstate Revitalization Richard] Tobe sees this as transformational. He is the only person I have talked to date who pissed on this as a project. . . . My whole thought process in bringing Elan on board is to make sure that we guide siting decision in
favor of downtown."
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"HE was not that enamored . . . . he was also not impressed . . . None of that impressed him."
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"I
spoke to Scott last week and relayed my preference for a downtown
site. I know he has a Board to deal with but I hope he impresses
upon them that a downtown site is preferable."
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"Would you like me to reach out to Scott to ensure that he understands direction . . . ?"
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"I feel like walking away from this whole thing and telling the community and hospital if you don't want this thing downtown then good luck at St Luke's and don't come see me for one ounce of state support."
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10 comments:
The emails should shock no one, that is exactly how the insiders here make decisions about how to spend our money. First, EDGE desperately needs something to do and to generate more revenue given its failure to attract any new jobs into the area. This urban renewal project will maximize its involvement and control. Same for the politicians including Brindisi and Mayor what's his name. The scandal here is that public will and medical need have taken a back seat to other interests. That is sure not the first time.
Wow, the EDGE and politicians used the taxpayer money to in effect dictate the site to the hospital group. There is no doubt that the tail wagged the medical and public preference dog. Once again, the "in" groups will play with a ton of our money.
The emails demonstrate the obvious; medical factors did not drive the site selection process. Even a casual observer would conclude that if a new hospital was an urgent concern to an area, a project that emphasized quickness and efficiency of construction and completion would have been developed. That was not the case here. Now, one can only hope, for the sake of our collective health and wallets that the downtown project is not plagued with time delay, budget overruns and political/governmental incompetency. Hope must spring eternal.
PS. Having been directly involved in these types of project discussion and planning processes myself in the past it is highly likely that the need to present a "sexy" project to the State for a good deal of state money steered the project to Utica's downtown. Both the need and sensibility for this approach can be debated but it should not be disguised or denied. Historically, government money often leads choices of project detail. If government and quasi government officials believed the downtown location was the key to receiving $300 million for a new hospital, they should simply admit it. Honesty is no sin.
Since when has Picente ever been honest about anything? Utica residents had better hold on to their wallets. They will take the police station & stick Utica taxpayers with the bill. Picente knows it & so does Palmieri. Anyone that believes these people is being played for a fool.
Read the emails and then listened to a Brindisi radio interview and can’t believe the level of secrecy and corruption. This is what we have representing the interests of the people living in this area?
It’s all lies and deception in order to spend (waste) taxpayer money on connected cronies and backroom schemes. Everything stinks - the site selection, evicting business owners, colluding to disrupt public resistance - all showing how bad this area has gotten.
Start with the Hospital, then the Maintenance Shop, then the Courthouse, then the Police Station, then the Parking Garage, then the vacant Hospitals … it goes on and on with our taxes going up and up to pay for it all. These people don’t care, taking your last dollar without a second thought.
Top it off with our current State Officeholder (Mr Brindisi) stating VERY clearly that if this Downtown Hospital doesn’t happen he won’t be there for even an ounce of State support? Isn’t he supposed to represent the ENTIRE district? He says we desperately need a hospital, but only in the spot he likes otherwise the community can go fend for themselves?
and he wants to go to Congress? Would that mean anywhere outside of Utica would be out of luck - Binghamton, Norwich, Rome, Oneida, the suburbs, the whole Southern Tier??
An interesting study would be to find out if under EDGE and the entrenched political leadership we have had negative or positive new, private sector job growth, population growth or not and an increase or decrease in our tax base? Now it appears that these same people are working hard to strip more properties off of the tax roles and convert most of Utica to a non profit paradise. We pay, they play.
And that beer museum will, after the ribbon cutting & the shine has worn off turn into another bottomless pit of a taxpayer funded fiasco. The number of average citizens who give a damn about craft beer wouldn't fill a shot glass. Especially when they find out that they'll be funding it out of their tax dollars & water bills.
Let's take Picente's office space in the county building & turn that into a beer museum. He can move his office out to Turning Stone. He works for them anyway.
Can we remind Picente that there is already a well renowned baseball museum in Cooperstown before he decides to saddle the taxpayers with another one of his brainstorms? How's that chip plant workin out for ya, Tony?
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