426 replies to this topic

[Jones133]

I know the State has plenty of land downtown still but I wonder if the CIty has any they could swap as part of Dix deal. Donations  contributed via someone like the Sierra Club could acquire Rocky Branch buffers so that the folks donating get to write off the donation (not sure of 306 Dix is tax exempt but I doubt it). Maybe even some sort of public/private partnership could be worked out for a DHHS complex downtown where the actual owner is a private entity that has to pay property tax (improves the CIty's position), and the actual project is subsidized by a city owned parking garage incorporated into the complex and the rent for DHHS ends up being less than maintaining the 24 buildings at Dix.

[ctl]

ChiefJoJo, on 11 December 2010 - 01:17 PM, said:

...Raleigh already has the lowest property taxes of any major NC city...

Doesn't matter. In the current political climate there will be no property tax increase by the City of Raleigh -- at least not until the State and County have figured out what they're going to do. By that time, the November 2011 municipal elections will be upon us. At this point it's unclear whether Meeker will stand for re-election.

[orulz]

Since Perdue is not seeking re-election, it seems that she may want to find a way to permanently dispose of the Dorothea Dix property.

http://www.newsobser...-step.html]Here is an article.[/url]

The entire 319 acre parcel was appraised at $60 million (today's value) and $86 million (if we were still in the middle of the 2007 real estate boom.) Meeker went on record saying that the city would pay a reasonable price for the land, and I'm pretty sure that McFarlane will follow that same line of reasoning. $60 million seems like a pretty big chunk just for the land alone, not to mention a huge pile of money to plan the park and develop facilities there. For Raleigh to bite off and chew by itself, this would certainly require a bond issue and a very big one at that.

We'll see where it goes from here.

[Jones133]

188 thousand an acre is pretty high. I think proximity to downtown was over valued. And what business does an appraiser have determining the "highest and best use" for a property? I call BS. That's  what zoning determines. Or an owner.

[Green_man]

From N&O:  "NC elected officials give permission to close Dix".  The timetable they laid out to close the mental health hospital is August 10.

My opinion of the park is, I'd like to see some of the oldest buildings converted to lofts or offices and then development of dense pockets of urban centers, but the majority left as a park.  I think it would be cool for the City of Raleigh to build a high ropes course similar to the one Durham has.  There is a massive one in Sandy Springs, Maryland outside DC that was amazing!

stRead more here: http://www.newsobser...l#storylink=cpy

[Gard]

I'd like to see some of the old buildings converted into a medical museum of sorts.  NC, in particular the Triangle, has a rich medical history.  We have numerous bio-medical companies here, two scools with a great reputation in pharmacy world, a school with world-wide recognition for its vetinary program and on and on.  A musuem would be a great partnerhip opportunity between the various levels of government, the schools, hospitals,  and area businesses involved in the medical field.

[Jones133]

Museums fit well with parks too as shown by the NCMA. The current NC museum of History needs an annex, and you could move medical/mental health and civil war stuff out here too (since Sherman parked a whole corps (20,000 troops) here for a month in April 1865). That might help get bipartisan support for a Raleigh bond for the remaining part to be purchased by the City for open space.