Neil St. Anthony, the Strib business columnist who last covered the looming Brookfield/City Center situation, comes out swinging with a tale of Minneapolis taxpayers losing $500,000 on a dispute with the widow of Cedar-Riverside developer Keith Heller. St. Anthony writes, "Although the case wasn't huge, it gives insight into how the city can play hardball when backing its subsidized-developer pals." The piece is at: http://www.startribune.com/stOnLine/cgi-bin/article?thisStory=83706621 St. Anthony concludes with a tough swipe against city development policy: "Minneapolis, through its aggressive and controversial development practices, is pushing up public indebtedness by taking land to subsidize development of downtown Target stores and entertainment complexes into which tens of millions of dollars are being poured to buy or force out existing owners and prepare the land for development by city-favored developers.... Because of the huge public debt the projects create, it takes years for such developments to generate taxes for schools, cops and parks while the debt is being repaid by the incremental taxes. It made some sense to prime development in the 1970s and 1980s when the downtown loop was in rough shape. It makes a lot less sense now. ... "Everybody hopes the Target development, Block E and the refurbished Milwaukee Road depot will be successful, pay down their public debt and generate incremental revenue for the roads and schools sooner than scheduled. Regardless, it's time for a breather and for the MCDA and its board, the City Council, to curb future handouts for developments that will take years to pay off for taxpayers." Comments/responses/rejoinders, as always, welcome. David Brauer List manager, Minneapolis-issues _______________________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - Minnesota E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
