14 February 2011

2 more "White Papers" (Governance and Housing)

White Paper #3
Governance

Well gang, we warned you way back in early October.  Yes, the hired guns from Colorado asked ONE question that week at the two meetings.  As far as I can remember, it was only asked once at those two meetings.  I was in attendance the first night and asked why they even brought up the matter considering the published nature of the project had nothing to do with the question.  I was quickly dismissed and the question was dropped.  But from that one question, they looked at the clicker results or didn’t even bother, and decided an entire white paper needed to be written.  This white paper seems to me to be designed to tell us all about the horrors of being a 4th class city in Missouri and the wonderful option we might have in a Charter City government.

Interestingly enough, a Charter City government will free the elected officials to have more power.  It seems our current administration is not happy with the power granted them by the Missouri Constitution and the laws of Missouri, they need to be freed of those shackles.  Now many of us are all in favor of self governing, but I am always a bit concerned when the cat is lobbying to be in charge of the canary cage keys.  Just sayin’.

As a demonstration of the desire to control your rights and the rights of your neighbors, this document goes a bit further in describing “urban fringe development”.  Now first of all, I find it a little amusing to call Branson “Urban”.  Next week we will be discussing our inner city crime, but I digress.  Anyhow, here is where we see the next step.  The step that includes lands outside the city limits.  In recent public discussions some administration officials explain that they feel that should be 5 to even 7 mile from the current city limits.

Commercial One Brokers happens to be in favor county Building codes and a more efficient and traditional Planning and Zoning in Taney county.  I guess most of the county population can just wait a bit and the City will do that for us.  SO, by this authority scenario, land owners outside the city, with no vote on practices inside the city regulation will be subject to those regulations.  Seems to me we fought a war or two over something like this.  Once again,   Just sayin’.

The third part of this “White Paper” discusses how to increase taxes.  We get a quick refresher in the wonders of being a Charter City and the powers that we will have unleashed if we go that route.  We get a history quickie and hear about the wonderful excise tax system on developments and contractors in Kansas City, Missouri.  You all know, that is the city that has no growth, it’s the one across the state line from all the new development in Kansas.  I guess that’s good news for Arkansas or maybe closer to home in Hollister.


White Paper #4
Housing

16 pages most appropriately summed up in two sentences on second page near the end of the section entitled  “2.0 Housing is an important local issue”

“Housing problems in Branson have traditionally been addressed by the free market rather than through extensive public efforts. The survey results and public meetings suggest that, while the city has a Housing Authority and there may be a continued role for this group, most of the suggestions for programs do not involve significant public sector programs."

I think that means we are not ready for anyone to order some new “projects” to be built in our inner city.  The results make me proud to be a citizen in the community.  Even if City Hall does not remember we are a bunch of boot strap puller uppers around here, the people surveyed do.  If we need more housing that is affordable, it seems the 16 pages tell us we need to make the housing more affordable and the people making more money so they can afford more.  If we can move the latter up and the former down.  A mid range will take hold.

One way to make housing more affordable to more people is to reduce the cost of development.  Le’me give you a hint.  I don’t think development impact fees and excise taxes and lower density with higher amounts of green space and donated land for trails and a percentage of a project in park space will help lower any development costs.  I don’t think required fire sprinklers in 1100 square foot homes with multiple doors will help with the costs.  I don’t think multiple loaded utility trenches will keep costs down. And someone hoping for a roof overhead is not too worried about a concrete sidewalk on both sides the street that had expensive curb and guttered edges.  Those people don’t care too much about 40 foot right of way dedicated for a 28 foot street.  They would be just as happy with a 15 foot setback and would forgo the need for that long concrete driveway that crosses the right of way and the fancy sidewalk.  They don’t understand a city that want to help by putting a few hundred dollar cost on hooking up to a sewer line that they then have to pay to use.  They just want a roof over their heads.

Page five has a nice chart showing employment numbers in the county and this little chart may show all of you something.  Seems jobs in the private sector are dropping while government jobs are on the rise.  OK, anyone else see a problem or maybe some similarities?

News Flash! Service workers are in the majority and many of those are seasonal.  They also seem to be the lowest paid positions in the community.  Thank God we’ve got an expert from out of town to help identify the problem.  They also found that Motel room occupancy drops in January and February.  Who knew! And after only 8 pages we can add to what we know from above the insightful realization that our population may indeed grow and if it does grow we might need more housing for that growth.

OK, to let them off the hook a little, they do identify several potential options that could aid in the development of some workforce housing.  I think they miss the mark in the cost savings arena and try a little too hard to show potential in incentives and Public/Private partnership as an answer.  I think the P/P partnership thing a good concept, but typically the Public side is more of a hindrance than a helpful partner.  Start by reducing the costs by being flexible on development restrictions.  Smaller lot requirement, smaller road or ROW requirement and waiver of utility hook up charges are among the most effective measures to get things started.

More to come.  I 'm beginning to see a trend.....


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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I read the white paper on 'govenance', which appears to be a sales & PR job to push a charter, and I read several things that concerned me deeply. I started to write a long comment about each point, but realized that was pointless.

I think that all that needs to be said is that if the City of Branson can't seem to run itself competently, can't seem to adequately and efficiently guide and regulate the economic development within its own boundaries, then why should we allow it dominion over anything beyond its own borders? The town has seen some explosive growth over the past twenty years-despite everything that City Government did to kill it-and the town has tax revenues that by whatever measure you choose is far beyond the resources of any other municipal government in the region. And yet, they seem to want a charter largely because it might allow them 'economic incentives and financing strategies' to squeeze more resources out of property owners and the business community. When will the monetary appetites of this city government ever be satisfied?

As a resident (and supposed "citizen") of Branson, I cannot in good conscience be a part of something that would inflict the powers of city government on my neighbors in the county without a good reason, something more than city government being power hungry and broke.

If the City Government wants its influence to sprawl all over the countryside, then it needs to ANNEX the countryside and take responsibility for it. Either that or coordinate master plans and zoning regulations between the city and the county, or between city and Hollister, etc. Which leads me to what I think has to be the most obvious and most ignored failure about this ENTIRE exercise: Why is there a Branson master plan, a Taney County master plan, a Hollister master plan, a Stone County master plan, and Forsyth master plan, a different master plan for Common Sewer District, a master plan for the Fire District a Branson West master plan, yada yada yada. . . . Why is there not a coordinated regional master plan for all of Western Taney and East Central Stone Counties incorporating the transportation, water quality, education, economic, social, moral, public health, public safety, and community needs and resources of the entire area into one common line of thinking? (For that matter, why is there nobody thinking about common planning through the US 65-Springfield to Harrison Corridor, or the White River Basin region, or even a larger region, etc. . . .)

Branson's search for input to justify whatever master plan it comes up with seems to be very inward oriented. I don't see much in any of this documentation addressing how this community fits into the larger scheme of things and how that might impact the town's future and how planning and zoning can be modified to improve anything.

to be continued . . .

Anonymous said...

. . . . continued

Another thing that bothers me about this whole master plan is that the entire exercise seems to be predicated on the idea that the town is going to continue to grow in the same pattern experienced over the past four decades. I'm not entirely sure that is going to happen. As far back as I can remember, there has always been somebody in town trying to figure out how to find a place on the strip of several acres to develop some new attraction, and they almost never are able to find anything. The push was so strong in the early-1990s that it finally pushed new development off of the Strip. That is not the case right now. I can think of at least ten different properties on the Strip of three to ten acres or more that could feasibly be redeveloped with new attractions or motels, starting with the thirteen acre Grande Palace, Ben's Wishing Well, Legends Theater, the Old Holiday Inn/Dogwood Inn, the Silver Fountain, and going on and on. And for the first time in my life, I don't see people in town with gobs of cash promoting deals to build new stuff. The Strip is in a position to be redeveloped, and all of us in real estate have been predicting a redevelopment of the Strip for a long time, but I don't see the market pushing it. I don't know what there is that anybody wants to build in this town anymore. The three different parties that were trying to buy the Grande Palace and tear it down three years ago are nowhere to be seen anymore, and it is not just current economic conditions. There are more Branson-type destinations being promoted now than there have ever been. I could go on and on about the fundamentals driving the tourism industry in Branson, but I think there is enough here to question whether tourism will grow in the same manner as in the past in Branson.

If Branson grows at all, it might be from something other than tourism (except the "Jesus Industry" part of tourism ie. promoting Branson as 'Six Flags Over Jesus'), and if Branson has a bunch of business-repellent barriers to entry, such as contractor business license fees, storm water management utility user fees against property owners, draconian development requirements, neighborhood improvement district costs, and a chartered city government without any restraint, as described in this piece-o-crap white paper, then any development that would have happened in Branson might go elsewhere, like Hollister, or Harrison, or Ozark, or Branson West, or anywhere but here, and hence no significant growth. Even the rosiest projections call for city of Branson (geography, not its government) to grow in population to maybe 10,000 or 12,000 by 2030. That level of growth can be accommodated by existing lot inventories with almost no new development. If the town doesn't grow economically in the same manner, a 'newly revised' master plan might prove to be pretty much irrelevant.