12 years ago
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Open Forum
I like the idea of who ever came up with the Open Forum idea. Makes it a little easier. If there is a topic you would like to discuss and I don't cover it as much as you would like go to the Open Forum Topic. When you enter a comment just try to make it clear for the next person what you are discussing by putting a topic in Caps. For instance: THE SCHOOL BOARD and then just say what you wish. Lets see how that works out for people. Thanks for a good idea. I think.
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About Me
- Chief Highknocker
- You aren't local until you have at least three generations in the cemetery.
21 comments:
Lawsonia Estates Development Update
Lindenwood Finally Snags the Brass Ring—Although It Is a Bit Tarnished
After nearly two years on the proverbial development merry-go-round, the Green Lake County Land Use Planning and Zoning Committee unanimously voted on Wednesday evening, September 17, 2008, to approve the preliminary plat submitted by Lindenwood Development, LLC for the proposed Estates of Lawsonia on the east end of the Green Lake Conference Center grounds.
The Committee’s approval was conditioned on a number of items being satisfied before submission of the final plat. The most significant of these items is a requirement that Lindenwood come to an agreement with the Green Lake School District for the dedication to the public of approximately six to eight acres of “green space” in the new subdivision for use by the School for educational purposes.
Kudos to the Green Lake County Board for finally approving the new courthouse and Health and Human Services building on Highway A. It’s about time the Board ignored the handful of naysayers who have been delaying this project year after year. Hysteria and misinformation is rampant with this issue. I’m glad the Board finally had the clarity and responsibility to make the right decision, rather than dressing up a shabby courthouse that needs more space than what’s available downtown. We need to build for the future rather than clinging to the past.
It is obvious that the former blogger will never be on the side of a "handful of nay say'ers" but will always agree with whatever the board decision is regardless what the issue or type of board.
Interesting! Maybe she is some kind of Board-Defender Superhero? School is right...City is right...County is right...Lindenwood is right...
There is a name for people like that. (And no, Democrat is not the word I was thinking of)
Exactly how many organization boards are you on superhero?
Who is going to pay for all these things?
Doesn't the county board listen to the news at night? The worst economic crisis in a hundred years. We don't even know the scope of it yet, and now we're committed to these massive projects. It's nuts.
For all of us concerned about costs and taxes, here's an interesting piece of news from the Ripon Common wealth (September 18).
The headline reads TAXES COULD JUMP 6.8 PERCENT
The article goes on to say "The future Lindenwood subdividion is raising land values in the town of Brookly - meaning taxes could rise for town residents."
"'It's the Lindenwood project, because in this case, it's the land values that shifted from either unproductive or woods or whatever and it's all been shifted to residential,'" said (Town Assessor Betty) Rowley.
"This means the Town Board can raise the 2009 taxes by as much as 6.85 percent without citizen approval, Rowey said. "
Regarding the passing of $27,681,741 for a new "Justice" Center, this seems like a very high price tag for a county of less that 20,000 people!
According to tables from the Wisconsin Department of Health Services, the population of Green Lake County has increased by 91 people since the year 2000. This type of slow growth hardly merits a 30 million dollar building. Perhaps in 20 or 30 years when there was an actual need for a larger facility should we then build one. In the meantime, this naysayer says that the current courthouse and human services buildings were adequate. How disgustingly materialistic do we Amercians need to be? Why don't we just rip down that ugly old courthouse and build some condos, or better yet some low-income housing so we can fill the new prison faster and justify it all.
With some focused organization and utilization of un-used space we would have been just fine until the actual need arose for a fancy, expensive new building.
The Vietnam War Memorial Moving Wall will be in Princeton from October 9th through October 12th. If you have never seen it in person, you owe it to yourself and your children to go.
I took my children to see the Moving Wall in September, 2001, just days after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. While I had seen photos of the memorial, nothing could prepare me for the flood of emotion that overtook me, it was a profoundly moving experience.
Whether you are liberal or conservative in your political views, nobody really likes war. If I had it my way, there never would have been any wars. But that doesn't change the fact that there have always been wars and for a variety of reasons. Our soldiers deserve to be honored with our hearts, and revered for their service to their country.
Nice to see that the fence has come down from around the "building site" where the Grocery Bag used to be. I guess (?) that the project has been nixed and I have heard that the lot is for sale. Anyone out there know what is up?
The development for the old grocery bag is still viaable. Given the financial markets and banks not able or willing to lend money, it makes sense the developer wants to wait until 2009 to determine a course of action.
Any land is for sale given the right price!
This is a note to property owners in Green Lake's downtown. Store owners are always complaining about the lack of business! Have you seriously looked at your store fronts? Weeds growing on your sidewalks, paint chipped, carpeting torn, cobwebs everywhere. That really makes me want to do business there. The sub shop is full of spider webs and doo-doo around the front door. Do I want food from that store? No way. Two Chez is not open very often even with their new liquor license. The gem shop has a poor looking front entrance and the hardware shop is hardly ever open. Stores put their garbage out on the sidewalks. That is not supposed to happen. Commerical businesses are to have their own waste containers in the back of their establishments.
Come on store owners, have pride in your property and make people want to come into your shops. It is time to stand in front of your place and see what the general public sees.
I have to agree that downtown Green Lake doesn't look so great. For one thing, we just don't have the beautiful old brick buildings like Princeton, Cedarburg, Eagle River, etc. There is not a cohesive "look" to our so called shopping district. In order to change this we would need to pass some type of ordinance about building conformity but I don't think this will ever happen here. The old buildings should have face-lifts and be restored to their former glory. And need I say anything about that PINK store??? I will never shop at the gem shop because it stinks like cigarettes in there!
We're lucky many of the businesses we do have, that their owners have taken almost a bare bones existence life style to survive. This would be a miserable town to try and do business in, but they're committed to our town; they've made an investment and sacrifice that many others have not made. Until you’ve made the sacrifice and investment yourself, rather than just bitching about it, Get off their backs!
LUCKY??? Boo hoo. Waaa waaa.
It seems unfortunate that Tracy Porter went to Princeton and Ripon after not being welcomed in Green Lake. She could have helped this town!
When was Tracy Porter not welcomed in Green Lake?
Why don't businesses survive in Green Lake? I've been downtown on Saturdays in the summer and seen lots of people. I was interested in going into a store on Saturday during Harvest Fest and found that it was closed. I would think that a store would want to be open during that time, when there are lots of people around. I don't know why it was closed. Maybe they had a good reason for being closed.
Tracy Porter went to Princeton because she was not welcomed in Green Lake. I am not sure of the year, but that is when. You can recall when her shop opened there.
Tracy Porter wanted to set up shop in Green Lake in what's now the Tourism office. But the woman in the Pink Shop who at the time owned two additional downtown businesses, flexed her very large muscle, not wanting the competition from Tracy Porter and kept her out. Yup. See what happened? Pink Store Lady avoided the competition alright. Now look what we've got for a downtown. You could diagram it: TP arrives in Princeton, business follows there, and begins to dry up here.
How can you keep someone out if they really want to open up a store?
It is so funny we were just talking about this very topic the other day with some folks from out of town. I have heard the tale of the selfish pink store lady more than once and think it is horrible that she has had so much influence in Green Lake's economy. I don't completely understand how she went about flexing her muscle and keeping Tracy Porter out of Green Lake, but she did, and that's a real shame. How can you keep someone out if they really want to open a store here? I don't know, ask Holly. Maybe if we all know how she did it, we can make sure she never does it again.
The problem we have now in downtown GL is that the commercial buildings are off the scale when it comes to their valuation. $300,000+ for the old state bank building! - that is and always has been a complete dump. So now the greedy store owners won't adjust their properties to fair market value, so they have to try and charge exorbitant rents to cover the taxes and make a buck. So businesses now need to turn $60,000 in sales just to pay for the cost of what's been sold and their rent/bills. So they stand there 12 hours a day 7 days a week for 14 weeks without making a dime in salary. That's good for the first year in business but gets old fast. So after 2/3 years of trying they pack up and leave and the cycle starts over.
We need to clear out that Court building and convert it into a retail mall (styled accordingly), then provide subsidized rent for people to bring their businesses to town, like a typical retail incubator program that has worked for so many other small towns.
Then when Green Lake has a critical mass of retail, perhaps a dozen or so varied stores with wide appeal, it will start to flourish on its own, much like Princeton did.
This can be achieved with planning and foresight by our leaders and a commitment from the residents.
But alas....we know it will probably never happen under the leadership that we have in town now.
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