Here is a copy of the RESOLUTION submitted to Mayor Garret Nancolas and his City Council at their meeting last night(April 7, 2014). The seeds of discontent have been festering since an earlier meeting at the Caldwell Train Depot on February 28th.
"RESOLUTION No.____________________________________________
Submitted to Mayor Garret Nancolas and The Honorable City Council of Caldwell, Idaho
Urban Renewal in Caldwell has spent in excess of $60 million, with little proven tangible results to be of any benefit to the citizens of Caldwell, its downtown, its businesses, and its property owners. Additionally, any input from those business and property owners have fallen on deaf ears by Chairman Eljay Waite and the board members of Caldwell East Urban Renewal Agency.
In the interest of all the Citizens of Caldwell, we the undersigned Downtown Caldwell business
and property owners request for immediate Caldwell City Council consideration the following:
1. Immediate dissolution of Caldwell East Urban Renewal Board, and its functions to be taken
over by the Mayor and City Council, ensuring a direct line of accountability in all matters of
urban renewal to the voters of Caldwell.
2. The remaining “Urban Renewal Increment” money, with exception to monies currently
required to pay current obligations and revenue bonding debt obligations, to be redirected
to the betterment of Downtown Caldwell.
3. Facilitation, via select committee, as to how to appropriate any remaining unencumbered
funds flowing to urban renewal. Any recommendations brought forth by this committee
shall be subject to approval by City Council of Caldwell.
Respectfully submitted by the citizens, business owners, and property owners of downtown Caldwell."
The above resolution was presented to the Mayor and City Council by former County Commissioner Glenn Koch. It was reported to THE GUARDIAN there were about 35 business and property owners at this city council meeting.
Additionally, there was an Ordinance document presented to dismantle Caldwell East Urban Renewal Agency and put all their functions under the Mayor and City Council. This would put some degree of direct accountability to voters and taxpayers. Currently, urban renewal laws written by the Idaho Legislature give wide powers of spending and no accountability in all financial matters conducted by urban renewal boards in Idaho.
Oddly, there was no date defined for when the group wanted an answer back from the Mayor and City Council. Perhaps this will come out as the group moves forward.
I own industrial property in Caldwell. Why not have the exess funds, in paragraph 2 be directed to improving industrial areas? Why the he!! is downtown business owners more entitled than others? I paid for the improvments on my property with my own money, why can't the downtowners do the same on there property? My taxes are just as high as the downtowners.
ReplyDeleteThe question is the 60 million gone . 40 million was drop on downtown and it not done Everyone in Caldwell should be asking what the hell Caldwell Leaders are doing .
DeleteI will try to decipher the above comment: $60+Million spent, the majority of which was spent in Sky Ranch Business and Industrial park. Downtown got the creek uncovered at about $6MM, TVCC, that nobody got the chance to vote on got around $10MM with the building, furnishings and other associated costs. The YMCA got $10.7MM plus other membership incentives to county, city and Simplot employees for reduced memberships for a specified period of time. Downtown is a blighted area and the owners pay a ridiculous amount of property taxation due to UR purchases of downtown property. UR has made a mess of downtown and has very little to show for all the money they have shelled out.
DeleteWe have a 5 block addition to the park system with all upkeep with Indian Creek and a college nobody asked for that competes directly with College of Western Idaho.
Talking to or trying to negotiate with anyone in Caldwell about any of the above is like talking to a pig. It doesn"t do any good and it annoys the pig.
ReplyDeleteWe need to concentrate on inproving our image. We are juged by the apperance of our down town area. It has become a mark of success to move out of Caldwell. Or if you move your quality business here you wil continue to live some place other than Caldwell. We have already put millions into Sky Ranch .But when the owners of thoes business ask to see our downtown they say no thank you to living here. It is to everyones betterment to fix this!
ReplyDeleteIts nice to see that the citizens of Caldwell are starting to pay attention to what their elected officials are doing. We managed to make some positive changes in Nampa last elections although $100,000,000 or so to late. Good luck and hold their feet to the fire.
ReplyDeleteIf downtown Caldwell is to ever be anything but a blighted slum some serious thoughts and actions needs to be given to the inhabitants of the upper rooms and apartments over the existing businesses on 7th ave. and Kimball. The people who occupy these places do not instill a sense of it being anything but an unsafe place to be after dark. I would think there must be numerous fire, safety and health code violations in those quarters.
ReplyDeleteNext, the train noise is insufferable and that needs to be fixed. There are ways to eliminate train horn noise with some mods to the crossings.
Next would be to eliminate all of the uses that do not belong in a downtown area. Rents commanded in downtown Caldwell do not justify doing much of anything if the owners of the buildings can't make a decent return on their investments.
I know a person who owns a building downtown and he gets $2.60 sqft. for rent. How he pays his taxes and does any upkeep at all is not something most people consider worth the effort. What the Gardner Company did in Nampa was nothing more than a prudent business decision. Boise had a lot of the same issues to fix 30 years ago but they got serious about cleaning out the decay and now have a pretty decent city that attracts a lot of business and commerce to their downtown.
I don't know how anyone can keep a place closed down and boarded up for very long but they can do it in downtown Caldwell because there is no reason to do anything as long as the owners pay their property taxes. City pride is all but gone in downtown Caldwell.
Letting the Optimists use the old King's building is another example of more blight on blight in downtown. What kind of parent lets their children go out and get their heads beat in all in the name of "sport". Moreover, what kind of service club would sponsor this kind of nutty behavior.
In a more perfect world, we would hire a contractor to demolish the Kings building next week, then send the bill to the city. We could reasonably argue that public sentiment and desired future for that now 'publicly" owned building was made very clear, and that sentiment was ignored in deference to a use that is injurious to the direction all interested parties are proposing for downtown, and...in the event of failure of elected or appointed officials to complete the requested task, and in lieu of tar and feathers, we simply did the job. I can hear it now, .."But you can't do that!!.. just did. And here's the bill for vetting demolition proposals, because you were supposed to do that job, also. All jobs that we've already theoretically paid you to do as servants of the public trust."
DeletePerhaps in a different time....
Living space in and around downtown Boise commands a premium price. Most of the restaurants, bars and other establishments appear to be doing quite well. I too can remember the bad old days of downtown Boise along with the strip clubs and other sleazy places. Boise was a relatively small city back then, less than 90,000 people if I remember right. Their efforts have paid off.
ReplyDeleteThere's one big difference: Boise has downtown government office workers - and downtown city hall workers, call center workers, bank workers, state capitol workers, etc. Caldwell has none. Don't look at Boise, that's why Caldwell is in trouble. Our mayor has went to too many luncheons at The Grove.
DeleteCaldwell is the County Seat and Mr. Nancolas let numerous government offices scatter hither and yon out of downtown Caldwell. Had he been an activist Mayor and worked to bring and keep government offices in downtown like, the Job Service Office, VA Clinic, SW. District Health Dept,, the County License offices, and the senior citizen housing project out at Linden and Chicago... What would downtown look like today? Yes, it would have taken some political will and arm twisting but it would have made for a far different downtown.
DeletePerhaps, by some chance, if the mayor, City Council, or Mr. Waite should happen to read this post, I would present these questions to you:
ReplyDeleteWHAT IF IN FACT IT IS THE PEOPLE OF CALDWELL WHO HAVE CHOSEN TO BE VOCAL AGAINST URBAN RENEWAL HAVE BEEN RIGHT ALL ALONG?
WHAT IF IN FACT IT WAS YOUR AGENDA THAT WAS WRONG ALL ALONG?
I can imagine the response would sound something like: YMCA, TVCC, CHRISTMAS LIGHTS = GOOD. Ok, that may be. My discontent doesn't lie in the parts, but rather the sum of those parts. Please tell me how these things (or nearly every other endeavor taken on by UR) have any form of:
A. Long term sustainability without tax dollars
B. Act as an economic engine to replenish the very tax dollars they rely on.
Indian Creek-No
Train Depot-Nope
20/26 Road improvement-Negative
Canyon Springs Parking Lot-Zip
Airport Terminal-Nada
The money has been spent, not invested.
The time has come for a changing of the guard. This is business. A quick walk downtown will show you the net gain of their efforts with $60 million. Let the people of Caldwell have a say in the remaining 10.
The seeds of discontent have been festering much longer than the February meeting.
ReplyDeleteWhy a response was not requested is beyond me, but not to worry, we will be getting a response. The most gratifying occurrence of the evening was the loud and sustained applause that Mr. Koch received upon closing his presentation - most of which came from the Vallivue students that were in attendance. After all the opening folderol, the rose-colored glasses came off and the ugly reality of downtown Caldwell was exposed.
The Mayor of Caldwell likes to bag about his Youth Group, but the truth is he has increase taxes on CITIZENS of Caldwell, meaning children, and the elderly to pay for the group. The urban renewal zone is so large its even on bare land. The rest of us are taxed to pay for city services. the Mayor had 60 million in his pocket to improve Caldwell and he has left one city official run the city and it looks like a bomb hit it. They have FAILED ..He should step down and apologize to us all..............
ReplyDelete