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Aug
21
Remember this post, from 7/27/07, about how the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority wants to submit a tax levy to us in November? And that article was published a day after the county commissioners voted 2-1 to increase the county sales tax, ostensibly to undergird a medical mart and convention center?
No one is saying the ports newly unveiled plans are bad. No one is saying the increase is too much, too little or otherwise objectionable.
But to announce it right on top of the sales tax increase?
Left-hand meet right-hand anyone?
Okay. That was then.
This is now:
Today, we can read more details about the port’s plans in this article about how Adam Wasserman, the port’s chief, wants to grow the port and Cleveland’s economy over 25 years.
But a little something seems to be missing from the information provided in the Plain Dealer’s story:
The strategic plan estimates the port would have to spend at least $100 million to relocate. There’s little detail on how that money could be raised, though discussions have centered on leveraging the $3.25 million the port receives yearly from a countywide tax, or selling off the port’s prime lakefront land.
Hmmm, then there’s this:
As for local impact, the port plans to use its powers to issue bonds and buy land to pursue big projects, the draft plan said.
But otherwise? Not a single mention of this from 7/27:
The Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority today voted to submit a 0.13-mill property tax levy to voters on Nov. 6.
The port authority receives about $3.2 million a year from the levy, or about one-third of its operating expenses. The rest of its income comes from fees from shippers and its development finance operation.
The current levy, which has been renewed every five years since 1968, does not expire until the end of 2008.
The port estimates the levy costs property owners about $4 per $100,000 of assessed value.
Sigh.
Not even a “they’ve scuttled the plan to float a levy.”
As one of my favorite college professors used to say in a thick Polish accent, “Sonow.”
What do we learn in today’s article?
That the port’s chief makes $248,000. People complain about school district superintendent’s pay? When they have to make kids grow into adults?
I don’t think so.
Not to say Wasserman doesn’t deserve or hasn’t earned this salary, I’m just raising the questions (and dubious myself, right now; after all – how do we judge how much a port authority director should make?).
And it’s a visionary plan. And we’ll get 50,000 jobs. And on and on.
But nothing about how to fund it.
What is it with our area’s leaders, vision but no funding ideas – that they want to make public anyway. Because I don’t for a second believe that no one ever has funding plans. They just don’t want to tell us about them.
Often, with good reason.
Which, you would think, means that they need to come up with more presentable ideas, yeah?
I’m telling you – this pattern isn’t anything like what I’ve been taught in leadership classes, or experience for that matter.
And PS – I forgot to mention: Mr. Wasserman, seriously now, not being snarky: if you want to start somewhere small, I’ve learned recently that bigtime longtime leaders think that, in order to attract the big money, you need to show that you care and are willing to spend the smaller dollars to show that you care (in the case I’m referencing: fixing bathrooms and ceiling tiles for some tens of thousands of dollars before trying to ask for donations of up to three-quarter of a million dollars to fix a bricks and mortar facility that’s nearly underwater).
So here’s my suggestion for the port, and this advice comes to you free:
The port authority’s website. Update it. Today. You’re in the news. Make that, ahem, portal, look shipshape, hm?
By Jill Miller Zimon at 12:29 pm August 21st, 2007 in Politics
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6 Responses to “City-County Port Authority funding: now you see it, now you don’t”
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oh boy. i’m not even sure where to begin…
you’re wrong. school superintendants are not charged with transforming children into adults. parents are! this type of thinking is what represents what is at the core of all the bad things that are happening in our society – a lack of personal responsibility. pushing one’s responsibility onto someone else will only exacerbate the misery.
Anon – Your comment is an oversimplification and has nothing to do with personal responsibility.
But, you know – you want to play that game? Then let’s have the county and everyone else start paying us fulltime caretakers $248K and see what happens.
Come on. You’re going to spin yourself right into the Earth’s core if you read hyperbole that way.
no, you are wrong. remember that we have four assistant superintendants that all make more than the second highest paid school superintendant in the state.
yes, four. again, four – all who make more than the columbus or cincinnati school superintendant. FOUR, 4, four, 4. you’re wrong. admit it dammit! stop justifying the existence of these thieves.
Anon – I hope that you are doing something more productive with your hostility on this issue than leaving anonymous comments. Perhaps if you made yourself known to the people who need to know how you feel in order to get anythign changed, then you would feel less angry? Just a thought.
Regardless, you’ve chosen to focus on the number. What about the job they have to do?
That was my original point – what Wasserman must do – does it justify his salary? What a district super does – does it justify his or her salary?
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