Lomb21, do you have a name? Of course there is a way -- if "the community" is prepared to pay for it. And it'll be a big bill -- in the millions of dollars. Even if you assume UCD contains waste, etc., you're still talking about recreating a substantial agency.
The "businesses that would have been the source of the NID/BID" would largely consist of Penn and Drexel, in dollar volume. That's because these businesses are huge in this neighborhood and dwarf other economic activities. We do not have a broad-based business sector in University City; we have what you see around you. So in funding your CID, you face a narrow range of choices. Either you accept you're working with Penn, and plan to work amicably with Penn, because you need Penn's money just as badly as Ray does; or you figure out how you're going to persuade some other entities in the community to come up with a reliable funding stream derived from another source. In the first choice, you've essentially recreated UCD. Acknowledge that, then, and live with it, I'd suggest. The problem with the second choice is why Ray's list of suggestions went nowhere, so he has to keep reposting it. Ray doesn't know how to live without Penn money himself. Likewise, he has no idea how any substantive community agency in University City could be funded without Penn money. Neither do I. When somebody proposes a practical plan to do so, based on real-world experience, we'll all take a close and respectful look at it, I'm sure. -- Tony West ----- Original Message ----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] This might be a long-shot, but is there any way that the community could take the concept of a NID/BID and "steal" John Fenton? It would be an administrative nightmare for someone (would I do it?? I'm not sure). My objections to the NID/BID were with the organizational structure and its control by the larger entities around us who, I felt, were trying to force "little" guys to pay while they continued to run it to their own pleasure. I feel like now is the idea time to act-- here's a guy (John Fenton) who has proven that he can provide "clean and safe". I've seen large companies run with a whole new business concept based on the presence of a highly competent employee before. In addition there is a structure in place to form a new "clean and safe" company -- the NID/BID. I'm not sure exactly how it would work, but we could form our own entity (call it a "CID") funded by the promises to pay of community people and businesses that would have been the source of the NID/BID. We have 300 signatures in favor of John right now. We could "hire/rent" from the current UCD as many ambassadors and machines that we needed (as long as the UCD agreed to have this quasi-partnership with us). We would hire John to run the CID entity. I am certain that we could do it less expensively and more inclusively (even truly serving the outer-lying areas of our boundaries).
