Legislature votes for ban--except in casinos, tracks, and bingo halls

A couple days ago I read an editorial that pointed out how poor our understanding of civics is because if we understood the sanctity our constitution, democracy, and capitalism holds for private property rights we wouldn't even be having the conversation about smoking bans.

But to save everyone from having to think about representative and limited government, Lou Fleury from Royal Oak's letter to The Oakland Press gives us this simple example.

[Lou and his friend] think the Legislature should also look at another scourge that plays out all over the state — an assault to health and welfare, a problem to workers in certain establishments who are subjected to this without regard for human decency. Yes, we’re talking about karaoke — the right of people to sing off key and give us headaches! My doctor told me I may suffer permanent physical or psychological damage.

I was complaining about this the other day to anyone that would listen. Somebody said, “Shut up will ya. Just don’t go to those places anymore.”

Wow! Don’t go to bars and restaurants that have karaoke. What a concept.

Indeed. How far we must have wandered when individual liberty and responsibility are new concepts.

Ask not what your congressman can do for you

We've come a long way from John F. Kennedy's inauguration speech of January 20, 1961. It is from this great speech that President Kennedy said, "Ask not what your country can do for you -- ask what you can do for your country." On a Townhall-like telephone conference with Congressman Sander Levin a few weeks ago this was the last thing on questioners' minds. All they most wanted to know was what the federal government will do for them.

According to the conference moderator, over 2000 people from the congressman's district were on the phone. It was the congressman's staff's job to screen questions. Maybe Kennedy's words were the last thing on the screeners' minds. The only questions I heard asked were basically:

• How can the government pay for my health insurance?
• How can the government pay for my child's education?
• How can the government lower gas prices?
• How can the government pay for my mortgage?

After answering a few of these, I could have easily taken the congressman's place because his answer to each was basically, "Democratic leaders in the house and senate are working to provide (fill in the blank) but we'd make better progress with a friend in the White House, instead of President Bush."

From the congressman's point-of-view, the only thing stopping Democrats from paying for everything was President Bush. If that's the case, I'm glad President Bush is there, and am not optimistic for either an Obama or Clinton presidency.

The high cost of health insurance, education, and the so-called mortgage crisis are likely the product of government interference in the first place. Many who get the joke chuckle when the hear,

patient: Doctor, it hurts when I do this
doctor: Then stop doing that!

If government interference helped create the problem, why do so many expect more government interference will remedy it? I had a grandmother that used to over-cook meat. She thought the solution to any tough, unchewable roast was to put it back in the oven.

When someone else is paying our tab we tend to be less careful what we put on it. This is the case with corporate expense accounts as much as it with insurance. Healthy people are perfectly capable of fighting off infections without antibiotics, but since they're made less expensive with insurance we're seldom reluctant to have them prescribed for us. This is an unnecessary medical subsidy that inflates the prices of medicines and contributes to the antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria.

Government subsidies also remove the pressure on colleges to yield to the economics of supply and demand. Administrative and staff salaries, building and maintenance expenses are all increasing faster than inflation, and both state and federal governments are racing to back-fill their budgets so the cost to families might remain affordable. Though universities teach supply & demand, as well as the basics of capitalism and free markets, apparently they prefer a more socialist funding mechanism.

Gas prices? Punish the oil companies. None of us are individually responsible for our nation's dependence on foreign oil. We have a right to live wherever we want, drive whatever we want, heat our homes and pools to whatever temperature we want, and exercise our recreational vehicles however we desire. The preferred mechanism to affording our wants is to have the government pay for it--which is to say taxpayers. And while income taxes are graduated--have "the rich" pay for it. In fact the less we pay in income tax the better the deal it is.

Congressman Levin also promised to rescue homeowners at risk of foreclosure or upside-down on their mortgages. Even before 2005 economists warned home prices couldn't keep going up. Everyone that lived through the Internet Bubble of 2000 or the savings & loan scandal knew the economists were right--but that didn't stop them from buying more home than they could afford or speculating that interest rates wouldn't rise.

So what else did President Kennedy say in that speech? Read it for yourself. You might notice he used words similar to what President Bush used in Israel that so upset Democrats. A good speech, like a good constitution, is as relevant today as it was when first composed. The only difference I see today from 47 years ago is that that speech seems more conservative than progressive, and more likely to come from Bush than either Clinton or Obama.

So I wonder to myself, have Republicans become more like Kennedy or have Democrats become less like him?

Talk cheaper than gas more than ever

This article was originally posted as a comment on a headline appearing in Ferndale Online.

People from Clarkston don't need to come to Ferndale for our downtown--they have their own and it's quite nice, if a little more spread out than ours.

No, Mr. Mayor, the reason Ferndale and other inner-ring neighborhoods will likely see a rise in popularity is because of the cost of gas. As even Ms. Shor of Clarkston said in the Free Press article, "As much as we've enjoyed living in Clarkston, we feel that the exurbs are too far removed from everything. I hate all the driving."

This is pretty much what I predicted in May 2007 in the article Selfish Sympathies:

When gas costs $4, $5, or $6/gallon, people may not be willing to sit in clogged traffic and begin demanding subways, elevated rail, or other public transportation that can be financed with new gas taxes. Buses fall somewhere between personal and mass transit, but are neither personal or mass. Mass transit is progress for Detroit and Michigan.

Cheap gas accelerates urban sprawl. It makes 20, 30, or even 40-mile or more commutes an inconsequential expense. Imagine how real estate costs might change if Detroit and its inner-ring cities like Oak Park, Ferndale, Royal Oak and others suddenly become more desirable properties than Clarkston and Addison because of their close proximity to mass transit, urban infrastructure, office and retail space, and $4-or-higher per gallon gas prices.

One problem in Ferndale is our priorities seem disconnected from our rhetoric. There's a lot of mass-transit-talk from city managers and council persons, but that doesn't stop the spending or construction of pork projects in Woodward's median. Both the Crow's Nest and the Woodward Avenue Tribute Totem Pole actually stand in the way of mass transit as surely as a young Ferndale mother, her two-year old, stroller, and our Welcome to Ferndale wall stood in the way of a car driven by an medically-impaired driver.

Instead of walls, jungle gyms, or monuments we should erect signs announcing "mass transit coming soon," or "this is a site of a proposed mass-transit station" whether it's proposed or not.

If we're going to proceed using the Woodward Avenue median as our memorial park to local government pork spending, then we should drop the environmentally-sensitive/green city/pro-mass-transit talk and start lobbying middle schools to consider Ferndale instead of Washing DC for their Eighth-Grade Trips.

Maybe that's what our city leaders have in-mind for Ferndale's future--tourism.

Why the fuss over a gay Dumbledore?

Why all the fuss over a gay Dumbledore? Many who cheer the popular wizarding school's headmaster's outing express contempt for those that jeer it. The irony that escapes the isn't-it-great-that-Dumbledore-is-gay crowd is that by celebrating the Harry Potter author's comments as brave and audacious they betray the fact they haven't accepted homosexuality as normal. The real benchmark of homosexuality's acceptance into common culture is when remarks such as Rowling's would be otherwise unremarkable.

Another benchmark would be when The Detroit News stops publishing Deb Price or Deb Price stops writing specifically on gay issues. Having a column dedicated to gay topics trivializes homosexual issues to the daily horoscope or crossword puzzle. The nation's, Michigan's, and Detroit's issues are gay issues. Insisting gay issues are separate from America's risks keeping gays separate. If acceptance is the goal of advocacy then advocates might consider fewer isolating tactics.

Common culture doesn't celebrate or overreact to the ordinary. It's hardly noteworthy anymore that Hollywood actors and actresses seem to change lovers and spouses with each new film, hairstyle, or self-congratulatory awards banquet. What is noteworthy anymore is when we discover a pair of celebrities that have been married for 20 years or more. Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward will be married 50 years this year and recently deceased Charlton Heston was married to his wife, Lydia Clark Heston, for 68 years.

Was anyone surprised Harry Potter married Ginnie Weasley or that Britney Spears did whatever outrageous thing she did last week?

Black History Month is another celebration that in 2008--143 years after General Lee's surrender, 53 years after Rosa Parks' bus ride, and 44 years since the Civil Rights Act--should be thought an anachronism. To draw attention to the accomplishments of black Americans as peculiarly distinguished from the accomplishments of all Americans suggests our nation still regards black accomplishment--academic or otherwise--as a novelty. The month-long blacks-are-people-too infomercials, documentaries and school programs are only necessary in a culture that either expects little of blacks, is compensating for its low expectations, or believes annual booster shots of encouragement inoculate black self esteem.

Think of it a four-week long anniversary of when a child first colored inside the lines. After a few years it's embarrassing to both the child and everyone invited to Chuck-e-Cheese's. The child is fine. It's the parents that need therapy.

As Shelby Steele suggested, it may be paternalism that keeps the training wheels on for minorities and not lack of opportunity or achievement.

It's not always a bad thing to celebrate what people ought to do, but repeated celebration risks drawing more attention to ourselves than the people or events we're celebrating. Our celebrations become less about them than being counted among the revelers. Are we truly glad Dumbledore is gay or do we only want to be seen being glad he's gay? Are our criticisms of those protesting the announcement for our benefit or Dumbledore's and Rowling's? Surely neither of them requires our coming to their defense--the former is a fictional character whose romantic attachments played no part in the plot created by the latter.

The ordinary doesn't attract attention to itself--that's what makes it ordinary. Unless we've come to a place where doing the right thing is unexpected we should stop acting surprised when it happens, and stop celebrating ourselves at the expense of others.

Why politicians lie to us: II

Last May I wrote an article called Why politicians lie to us suggesting they lie because we want them to. With all the clamor for government bailouts for mortgages, what politician would dare telling voters their problems were brought on themselves (both lenders and borrowers) or that the best thing for some troubled homeowners is to lose their homes?

In April 22's Detroit News, the Associated Press reported housing prices may slump more than during the Great Depression. The doom and gloom reported there will likely lead many to believe we're bound for a depression of historic proportions.

"An influential economist who long predicted the housing market bubble cautioned Tuesday that the slump in the U.S. housing market could cause prices to fall more than they did in the Great Depression, and bailouts will be needed so millions don't lose their homes."

I really hope that didn't surprise anyone.

How many more homes do you think have been built since the 1930s? How much greater a percentage of the population owns homes today than in the 1930s? How much more urban sprawl exists now than in the 1930s?

What we should be wary of is the last part of the sentence above, "... and bailouts will be needed so millions don't lose their homes."

I'm reminded of a column written by John Stossel about how some homeowners deliberately build homes too-close to the ocean because they know the government will pay to rebuild it. Because the homeowner doesn't bare the cost of the risk, and neither does the insurance company, they cavalierly build homes they couldn't afford without depending on federal bailouts. We feel bad they lose their homes, but if they were forced to bare the cost of their risk they may chose to live elsewhere--or at least with less of your tax dollars.

Maybe there were millions who weren't ready to afford their homes. Maybe there were millions who speculated with their lenders that home prices would continue skyrocketing. Do you remember the savings & loan scandal or when the dot-com bubble burst? They were only 18 and 8 years ago respectively.

Who says we don't learn from our mistakes? The government paid for the first, didn't pay for the second, and politicians and the media have all agreed having the federal government pay for our losses scores more points with voters than not--regardless the cost to the treasury.

Maybe there's an opportunity for Detroit and its inner-ring neighborhoods to help these people find more affordable accommodations. Maybe the mortgage crisis, combined with high gas prices, creates a unique opportunity to re-populate cities by creating demand for apartments, townhouses, and other more affordable homes.

So if politicians aren't blatantly lying to us, at least they spend more time telling us what we want to hear rather than what we need to hear. I believe it's possible to change that, and am always on the look-out for that politician.

It takes a village to spoil a politician

Americans are too distracted by the shenanigans of federal and state officials. If the congresspersons and senators of today were the commissioners, trustees and council persons of yesterday then we should pay closer attention to our local government. It is in our own backyard where poor decisions are tolerated, conflicts of interest overlooked, and politicians discover there's rarely a spanking for poor behavior.

Council's decision Monday night to approve the Downtown Development Authority's (DDA) request to extend a 1.3794 millage to businesses in the recently expanded Principal Shopping District (PSD) is a textbook example of bad governance and inadequate due diligence. Unfortunately, council's collaboration (councilwomen Baker served on the PSD committee) with the DDA to expand its powers, boundary, and tax burden on local businesses regardless the DDA's misrepresentations (read: lies) doesn't attract the negative press and attention it deserves.

How can a council approve a request from the DDA when that request is based on misleading numbers, misleading statements, failure to notify the public, and without substantive and challenging questions to verify the DDA's claims? How can a council constituted to represent the public tolerate the actions of an agency whose board doesn't represent its public? How can the council indulge the DDA's expansion in both size and taxes without proof of need or an invitation from businesses?

They can because promises to not raise taxes are more like "guidelines" than actual "promises." They can because monuments to council's self-importance are worth $30,000 and equipment for the axillary police is not. They can ignore evidence and refuse investigating complaints because their political philosophy values good intentions over full disclosure and accountability.

They can because the village they came from and are accountable to doesn't hold them accountable and rarely discusses their behavior. We've become enablers.

And some of these spoiled children will become tomorrow's candidates for county, state, and national office. Is it any wonder the state can't balance its budget, control spending, or attract businesses and investment? Is it any wonder congressmen and senators pack bills with earmarks and pork? Are they making policy or sausage?

Perhaps this is an unintended consequence of term-limits. As representatives are term-limited out of Lansing lessor politicians are socially promoted to take their place.

Perhaps we'd better keep a closer eye on the kindergartens. They're tomorrow's bus drivers in Washington, Lansing, and everywhere in-between.

All of this is an introduction to the original text of my comments to city council on Monday, February 25. Because of time limitations I edited it on-the-fly (and my diction was poor and I read too fast) so there are some items below that didn't make it to video.

A misleading effort

• The presentation the DDA made to council in 2007 contained misleading information and omissions designed to make our DDA appear sympathetic and under-funded.


• They under-reported their income on charts by $150,000.


• They made false comparisons to Birmingham, RO, and Rochester


• They misrepresented opposition to the district's expansion-stating in memoranda to council there was no opposition. In fact, multiple business owners both within the original and expanded boundaries approached both the DDA and city council, formally and informally, stating their opposition to the expansion and are willing to testify about those emails, phone calls, and meetings.


• The already too-cozy relationship between the DDA, city employees, and city council resulted in a lack of due diligence, interrogatory, or even general discussion about the merits of the expansion.


• Today the millage is requested on the Proposal-A limited taxable value of properties, but already the DDA is scheming to assess the tax on the state equalized value, which will cost all businesses roughly twice as much.


• They have already approved a BUILD grant application without the money to fund it--then have used that application as justification for higher taxes
  
  
  
  • It's odd the BUILD grant application came from the president of Ferndale's Chamber of Commerce. The Chambers was conspicuously quiet regarding the $0.35/sqft. PSD tax. Earlier statements indicated the membership couldn't reach a consensus, but the prematurely-approved BUILD application suggests a conflict of interests. If the applicant had hoped for the BUILD request to be approved and new it depended on the PSD tax--it would be to the applicant's advantage to sit on the sidelines and neither support or oppose the tax.
  
  
  • Communications between the DDA, city, and council members FOIAed by Tiffani Gagne on behalf of nopsdtax.com substantiate the DDA, city, city council, and the applicant were aware of the BUILD request, the DDA's exploitation of it, and advice from elected officials on how to get around funding limitations as well as offers to pay for it from city funds.
  
  
• In memoranda to the city requesting this most recent tax increase, the DDA claimed the city council put them in a bad position by approving the expansion request without an onerous tax--forgetting it was themselves, the DDA, that asked for the expansion in the first place.

A bad-faith effort

• Even after admitting now is bad time to raise taxes the DDA is requesting additional taxes.
  
  • DDA, council members, and even the the mayor have described this as a drop in the bucket.
  • No rain-drop blamed itself for floods in New Orleans
  
  
• Even though they expanded the district to include 187 new businesses they've made no effort to include those businesses on the DDA's board, and no board member has thought this lack of representation was important enough to sacrifice their own seat.


• They've not included new businesses in the DDA's directory--even though that expense is minimal.


• They've not patronized Ferndale businesses for their own expenses--specifically printing expenses.


• They've not organized the Focus Groups they promised to "educate" and "involve" businesses in the expanded area, but they've wasted no time trying to tax them.


• They've not mailed businesses any information warning them this request would be before council tonight or explaining specifically what services they can expect in return for the tax.


• They've not spent any effort trying to trim their own expenses, as many businesses and even government agencies are forced to do in tough economic times. If they had they could easily have found $18,000 in lease expenses alone--with money left over.

A misguided-effort

• In candidate Craig Covey's own words, "... our downtown is sparkling."


• Our businesses and local charity groups have already proved they can simultaneously promote downtown Ferndale and raise money for charity or profit on their own--without the DDA's assistance.


• Our DDA, which was intended to be a business accelerator, has become a business breaker--through its own policies, rules, permits, fees--many of them duplicating city hall requirements--it has made opening businesses in Ferndale more difficult, not less difficult.


• Meanwhile, the Hilton Road corridor is in desperate need of attention. Economic development programs are available for it as well, but our city seems preoccupied with its downtown.


• perhaps it's too comfortable with its downtown and prefers to rest on its laurels than attack the challenge of Hilton Road, whose revitalization over the next 5-to-10 years would mean more to our entire city's economic health, including our downtown's, than any incremental improvements in our downtown alone.

I could have gone on, but council passed a new rule in January limiting public comments on agenda items to three-minutes, similar to the three-minute call-to-audience limitation. More time would have allowed more specifics, more congruity, and perhaps a more persuasive argument.

If that wasn't the intent of the egg timer, it's at least a fringe-benefit to council.

Sign ordinances threaten to remove character from cities

A recent Detroit News letter to the editor caught my eye this AM.

Sign rules imperil small firms

The Feb. 11 article on the fate of Alban's freestanding sign in Birmingham should serve as a wake-up call to planning and zoning boards across the state ("Restaurant's big wheel seeks new home"). Municipalities have needlessly passed stricter sign regulations that have all but eliminated the ability of small business owners to create similar unique signs for their business.

Furthermore, the increasingly restrictive regulations on outdoor advertising stifle the ability of small businesses to compete with the ever-growing number of chain restaurants and stores. Without rethinking sign regulations, beloved landmark signs such as Alban's and other true works of art will only be seen in museums and private collections.

Martin Engel

Petoskey

Ferndale has a sign ordinance that threatens to extinguish its character, too. Imagine how much difficulty Wetmores might have trying to stick half a car out its second story window given our current ordinances. Yet that car (or half-a-car) has become a Ferndale and Woodward icon every much as Alban's wheel sign.

A couple months ago, Doug Fresard endured an interrogation from councilman Galloway that would give John McCain flashbacks. To demonstrate what a populist he is, Galloway showed no consideration for Fresard's $11 million investment in their new Ferndale Dealership and drilled him about a monument sign the dealer wanted in their front lawn. Apparently the monument wasn't compliant with the city's sign ordinance and despite evidence of its tastefulness and utility Galloway objected, wondering what good are ordinances if they aren't enforced?

After an hour's drilling, Galloway relented and Fresard was able to escape council chambers with a variance, his grandfather's watch he'd hidden someplace council wouldn't look, and a little post-traumatic-stress.

Our downtown's authenticity is born from the creativity of our businesses. I think council should give our businesses a little leeway in deciding how best to promote their businesses, spend their own marketing dollars and maybe, just maybe, create the next Ferndale icon