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St. Paul E-Democracy Discussion about
DISTRICT COUNCILS IN ST. PAUL
Brewery Cafe - 945 W 7th - April 14th - 7-9 PM
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Brett and Guy -
First I apologize for misspelling Brett's last name.
Just so there is no confusion, I firmly support Mass
Transit, the workers and their strike. I even
initially thought that Ed Fesler's petition, saying
"No Stadiums until the transit strike is settled" was
a good idea.
However as I sat in a State Rep's office who is a
fervent opponent of Mass Transit discussing strategy,
it occurred to me that asking him to sign a petition
like this would either elicit a laugh or be a total
disaster.
The point is that some of the most vocal opponents of
new publicly funded stadiums are some of the most
conservative state reps, who ordinarily I do not see
eye to eye with on any issue. At the same time, two
years ago, some of my best friends, liberals DFL'ers,
Sandy Pappas, Ellen Anderson, Andy Dawkins, Dick Cohen
lined up to give hundreds of millions to Carl Pohlad.
In our fight to stop this massive giveaway of our tax
dollars I will take allies wherever I can find them.
So as much as I support Mass Transit, (see my previous
posts about constructing a multi-county wide rail
system), I believe we cannot afford to tie these
issues, for fear of alienating some of anti-stadium
opponents.
Now this does not mean, that strike supporters, Ed,
Brett, Guy and others should not do this strategy. I
am just saying it is not wise for those of us, who
have built this fragile anti-stadium coalition, to use
this tactic.
Dan Dobson
No Stadium Tax Coalition
Saint Paul
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
www.NoStadiumTax.com
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Message: 6
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 2004 08:35:25 -0500
From: "Guy Western" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [StPaul] Dan Dobson's Comments
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
It's hard to ignore the glaring inconsistency that
Minnesota voters are being asked time and time again,
to the point of badgering, to give public money to a
private industry where salaries are approaching a
billion dollars a year, while we're told we can't
afford health care for our transit workers.
This chronic begging by an enormously lucrative
industry for more corporate welfare is not occurring
in a vacuum. We've just realized another unexpected
$30 million shortfall in expected state revenue from
corporate taxes in an already deficit-ridden tax
climate for all levels of government. Is a new
stadium--or is it up to two new stadia, now?--on the
top of THEIR list of potential, private, corporate
investments?
Guy Western
the West Side
----- Original Message -----
From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Wednesday, April 14, 2004 1:42 AM
Subject: [StPaul] Dan Dobson's Comments
Dan Dobson has made the point that he would prefer
that Ed and I (Brett Sprangel, not Brent Spengler) not
link the transit workers strike to the stadium issue.
I think that is fair enough. My point was that if
> we do not have the money to pay the transit workers
the amount agreed on in their contract that we do not
have the money to pay for a new stadium. I also
believe that Ed was speaking hypothetically, but I
have
not spoken to him personally, so I am not certain.
Brett Sprangel
East Side
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