This Week in SME Theater
The question lately has been which card in SME’s House of Cards will go first.
One rather good guess is the “spot-zoning” case which landed at the high court yesterday and which threatens to undo SME’s plans. If the Sup Ct “unzones” the project, it would give all involved in SME/Southern a chance to say, “You know, we gave it a try, but let’s leave it there…” The Trib has a write-up on the Sup Ct hearing here.
A district court judge ruled that the zoning comported with the law. On appeal, it seemed that the high court might agree. But according to one eyewitness the atmosphere in the courtroom was tense after Cascade County’s legal counsel introduced a new argument that the County’s zoning rules had changed, and therefore that the matter before the cour was moot. “This set the tone for numerous and very provocative questions by the judges grilling the SME attorneys,” the eyewitness, a CCE sympathizer, reports.
We will just have to wait and see. In the meantime, we watch for the Burns & McDonnell consultants report, that holy grail of outsourced decision-making, the $59,000 extrication — yes, you mere non-consulting mortals, bow down and pay heed to this glorious gocument. Uh-uh, don’t question it — They’re consultants!
I digress. The point is that their report will be out hopefully before the end of this month. I’m pretty assured of the consultants’ smarts and integrity — just amused how we seem to think consultants can make the hard decisions for us — and I think they will give the City reasonable advice which I can paraphrase along these lines: [ahem] “Go, get out, bail as soon as your contracts and legal obligations allow you to do so…” I hope a few “exit strategies” are included in the consultants’ price-tag.
The funny thing is, losing would probably be the best thing for SME. The highwood location was necessary for a coal plant . A gas plant would probably be better placed north of town closer to high voltage lines , gaslines and in the industrial park where the waste heat could be sold to the malting plant and future industrial instalations. This would give SME the justification for losing all that investment in the highwood site .
The question is, ‘who’ will pay for the millions lost? The city? Co-ops? County?
The consultants BETTER have some sound advice, and bett not be to ‘throw good money after bad’!
Well anon 10:12, we just today found out a portion of your question. It is the taxpayers of this city taking it in the shorts. Thank you Randy Grey, Mr. Lawton, Ms. Balzarini, and the infamous gang of four current city commissioners. Also, a big thanks to county commissioner Joe Briggs and his partner ex-commissioner Lance Olson both of whom helped spearheaded this fiasco on the populace…..
Now go see the Travis article just posted this evening Friday November 20th.