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mayor candidates and limited government

gochberg

By gochberg
in Nashville Coffee House

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nashvol85 Hamlet

nashvol85

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Government has to be involved in development to some point...otherwise we would have a traffic nightmare (worse than we already do). Not only that, but issues such as police and fire and other service coverage is affected by development. They should be involved to a good degree on what gets built or what doesn't.

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gochberg Unincorporated Area

gochberg

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Actually, government is rarely "front and center" (as Lexy puts it) when it comes to development. Nearly all of the developments that get people excited on this forum, such as the Gulch or downtown condos, are financed and designed by private companies. Government does play a role, but it is peripheral.

Where government does play a "front and center" role, it is often in projects that do not age well. Urban renewal projects from 1950's to 1970's were the high point of govenment involvement. In Nashville, it created the highways through the center of downtown and all the public housing. (These projects turned my neighborhood, Edgehill, from one based on private home ownership to one where, according to the planning dept, 42% of the housing is owned by the government or non-profits.) More recently, we have the football and baseball stadiums, possibly a convention center, and tax-increment financing of affordable housing units. Metro Planning has just bulldozed several public housing projects, as have many cities, most famously Chicago. New Haven, CT (where I lived for 10 years before coming to Nashville) has been a leader in government projects designed to help cities. They just bulldozed their stadium because it consistently lost money. All these projects are destroyed after a few decades because they were poorly designed and planned. When we use politics to allocate resources rather than the free market, it often leads to waste.

This is what I mean by limiting government involvement.

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producer2 Hamlet

producer2

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Actually, government is rarely "front and center" (as Lexy puts it) when it comes to development. Nearly all of the developments that get people excited on this forum, such as the Gulch or downtown condos, are financed and designed by private companies. Government does play a role, but it is peripheral.

Where government does play a "front and center" role, it is often in projects that do not age well. Urban renewal projects from 1950's to 1970's were the high point of govenment involvement. In Nashville, it created the highways through the center of downtown and all the public housing. (These projects turned my neighborhood, Edgehill, from one based on private home ownership to one where, according to the planning dept, 42% of the housing is owned by the government or non-profits.) More recently, we have the football and baseball stadiums, possibly a convention center, and tax-increment financing of affordable housing units. Metro Planning has just bulldozed several public housing projects, as have many cities, most famously Chicago. New Haven, CT (where I lived for 10 years before coming to Nashville) has been a leader in government projects designed to help cities. They just bulldozed their stadium because it consistently lost money. All these projects are destroyed after a few decades because they were poorly designed and planned. When we use politics to allocate resources rather than the free market, it often leads to waste.

This is what I mean by limiting government involvement.

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bnaflyer Whistle-Stop

bnaflyer

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Actually, government is rarely "front and center" (as Lexy puts it) when it comes to development. Nearly all of the developments that get people excited on this forum, such as the Gulch or downtown condos, are financed and designed by private companies. Government does play a role, but it is peripheral.
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producer2 Hamlet

producer2

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To gochberg:

I appreciate your thoughts but I want to take a moment to review your comments about the Convention Center. Gaylord does a great job of operating their facility in Pennington Bend. Gaylord also reaps all the financial rewards of that facility as they should, they built it. Gaylord is also turning away a lot of business because A. They don't have space, and B. they are looking for a specific profile of client for their hotel. It is a known fact that the City is losing millions of dollars in potential revenues because we do not have an appropriate facility in our downtown to market to large conventions that would like to make Nashville a stop on their yearly tours. There are litterally hundreds of organizations that are too big to go to Gaylord that could and would utilize both the GEC and a new convention center for their conferences. I have a meeting next week with a client of ours, a service organization that brought 15,000 people to Nashville the last time they were here and held their general session in the GEC and their trade show at the center. They too are suspect that they will not be able to continue coming to Nashville unless more space is created. These meetings are booked years in advance and unless we move to rectify this situation we will no longer realize tourism as the #2 industry in our city. Ask Orlando if multiple facilities will work. They have Disney, a 2 million square foot city owned center, and yes Gaylord as well. That lost revenue for businesses and workers should be compelling enough to make the argument for a new center and located in close proximity to the GEC so they both benifit.

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gochberg Unincorporated Area

gochberg

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To producer2:

If there is strong demand for a larger convention center, then why can't a private company build it without taking $450 million of taxpayer money? Showing that there is demand is not enough. There might demand for coffee houses, but that doesn't mean it makes sense for the city to finance their construction. I know that convention centers are larger and affect the city to a greater degree, but the fundamental idea of what government's role should be is not that different. I think a complicating factor is that other cities effectively subsidize their convention centers with government financing, and in order for Nashville to compete, they might have to also subsidize. While there is some truth in this, I still think that Nashville would be better off leaving business endeavors to private companies.

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producer2 Hamlet

producer2

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gochberg:

Is Waffle House going to share with Shoney's? I don't think so....the Convention Center itself is the space needed to bring people into our city and fill the hotel rooms, eat in ALL of the restaraunts, go to our musuems, etc. So will the Hilton Suites build a center that the new Westin can profit from? NO, so that is why city government builds the buildings using funds generated by taxes placed upon ALL hotel rooms within the county. That is how the current convention center paid off the bond floated by the city with NO TAXPAYER MONEY. Go to this website http://www.nashvillemusiccitycenter.com/cost.aspx and it will explain how the coalition plans on financing this project.

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