Monday, January 12, 2009

I've been wondering for a couple of years when this shoe would drop.

I think this development was premature by about two decades. http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/011209/geo_376388128.shtml

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

That one house sitting there looks kinda sad.

If you have not seen it, you may be interested in the liberty ships site

http://dlg.galileo.usg.edu/CollectionsA-Z/vsbg_information.html?Welcome

Jay Moreno said...

thanks. That was interesting. After my father was wounded in the Battle of Monte Casino in Italy,and after healing and physical therapy, he spent the rest of the war as a civilian ship builder building the same class of liberty ship at the Savannah Ship Yard.

Pollyanna said...

Jay:

Did you attend the St. Marys City Council meeting last night? If so, was there anything exciting that went on?

Anonymous said...

http://jacksonville.com/news/georgia/2009-01-12/story/landmar_subsidiary_defaults_on_its_durango_pro

More bad news for the City of St. Marys.

Jay, I rely on your opinion as its the only logical opinion available.

What happens in reference to the 10's of millions that the City of St. Marys borrowed to complete water and sewer infrastructure for this property? The PSA backed the bond. I believe it was for 35 million, or so, via Bank of America. What happens if they cannot afford the payments due to all of the bad decisions now coming back to haunt St. Marys?

Jay Moreno said...

No, I did not attend the meeting last night. I had a prior commitment at the college in Brunswick. I pretty much follow the Lilliput governance via the T&G nowadays.

Jay Moreno said...

I've inputted that URL (Cut and pasted exactly) a couple of times. I'm getting a GTU page, but not a LandMar story. Can you give me some guidance as to where to lokk on the page?

Anonymous said...

Go to the Georgia Times Union and type in Landmar in the search box. That's the only way I was able to pull it up. It is also on the front page of the printed version. Thanks

Anonymous said...

http://www.jacksonville.com/news/georgia/2009-01-12/story/landmar_subsidiary_defaults_on_its_durango_project

Jay Moreno said...

Okay - now I've found the article.

Well, they could defualt on the loan - in which case city's bond rating would be in the toilet for years, or, they could "simply" raise taxes to cover it - something they should have done for this year, but lacked the political courage.

Eventually, the economy will come roaring back and the roofs needed to support the debt service will be built. However, it's going to be damned tight until then. I think that city tax increases are inevitable.

Anonymous said...

Again, your'e absolutely correct.

To top that off they are now out of almost $62,000.00 in taxes from the Durango property.

Jay, give me your honest projection:

Based on where the mileage rate is now in St. Marys, what would you project the mileage rate be set at next year? Based on the fact that it should have been set at 6.1 this year instead of 5.6.

I tell you someone really needs to stop the madness. It's evident that several people are mortgaging our community for self benefit. And the decisions of the City Council to become bed mates with these people is deteriorating our financial infrastructure more rapidly.

How long must we ALL look on. At some point the same vengence for justice taken against the ex-Sheriff needs to be implied here!

This is really getting to be ridiculous and we are ALL watching it happen.

Jay Moreno said...

well, if you will recall, the 6.1 wasadequate to cover the nut, but just barely - and that was with cuts. The fact that council could not muster the political courage to go all the way to 6.1 now means that when the inevitable millage rate increase comes, it will have to be higher than it would have been had they not wimped out. As to how much higher, I don't have access to sufficient data (nor, frankly, the time) to calculate it.

Yes, I expect some incumbents will be unseated next time around.

Jay Moreno said...

Oh, and don't be surpised if one or two of the successful challengers run on a promise to, among other things, find a new city manager.

Anonymous said...

Bill Shanahan definitely needs to go!! He does not have a clue. Based on reading the Woodbine Blog the City Manager of Woodbine is equally deficient.

I can only hope for some type of divine intervention, to save the people of Camden County from the elected officials.

Again, thanks for your projection. You answered just as any analytical person would have.