"Voice of OC" All Over Fairgrounds Issue
TODDLER SKIPPED WALKING - IN FULL SPRINT NOW
The fledglin
g Voice of OC online news source - in business for a little over a week now - is all over the ongoing drama of the sale of the Orange County Fair and Events Center. Although late to the game, the coverage provided by this new, aggressive news operation has been way ahead of the competition.IS RIGGY THE RIGHT GUY?
I mentioned in a previous post their article entitled, "Would this guy help or hurt Fairgrounds negotiations", published April 6th, that deals with the rumor that Jim Righeimer is about to be nominated for a position on the committee being created to come up with a proposal for the purchase of the Fairgrounds by the City of Costa Mesa. You can read it HERE.
TWO PIECES TODAY
Today Editor-in-Chief Norberto Santana, Jr. published two articles, "Who are the Advisors to the Advisors", HERE, and "The Deal That Keeps Getting Worse", HERE. Both of these pieces should be required reading for anyone seriously interested in this issue.
THE "WHO" PLUS COUNCIL CHAOS
In the former he gives a good summary of events of the past couple days, including the fiasco at the city council meeting Tuesday night.
IN-DEPTH SUMMARY
In the latter he provides an excellent summary of events so far, covering the intrigue involved with the sale of the Fairgrounds from the beginning.
CLOCK IS TICKING ON THE PROPOSAL
I don't know w
hat's going to happen with the proposal being hammered together by City Manager Allan Roeder, Project Manager Becky Bailey-Findley and their mysterious and as yet unnamed team, but it's highly unlikely they will be able to get a final proposal together and approved by the city council by the deadline of April 19th. Those of us who want them to succeed can only keep our fingers crossed and hope their efforts bear fruit. That clock is ticking...MANSOOR DETERMINED TO HOG THE SPOTLIGHT
In the meantime, Allan Mansoor seems determined to use his position as mayor to keep the spotlight on himself throughout this process. His little fit of pique at the city council meeting Tuesday was a perfect example of what we can probably expect from him from now until he gets whipped in the June Primary election.
Labels: Allan Mansoor, Allan Roeder, Fairgrounds Sale, Voice of OC
posted by The Pot Stirrer at 4/07/2010 11:29:00 PM
3 Comments:
Ah, the OC Voice. The mouthpiece for the labor unions that are slowly bankrupting California. Getting news from them is no different than getting your news from Fox. I'm disappointed in you Geoff, gushing over something this slanted--"when you trust your television, what you get is what you got." Funny, you pick on Monahan and Mansoor for speaking on the Fair, but Foley can do no wrong.
Pete, the Voice of OC is a week old. I, too, am apprehensive about the kind of coverage big labor might get, but am keeping an open mind until they mess up. In the meantime, they are really digging into this Fairgrounds story. Foley did her due diligence BEFORE she went on KOCE - she made two separate contacts with Allan Roeder to clear what she could and couldn't say. Monahan, on the other hand, just blurted out the lease/purchase information on the radio in January, effectively letting that cat out of the bag. I don't recall criticizing Mansoor for "speaking on the fair".
The question is how does the City finance the purchase of the property without incumbering Costa Mesa taxpayers. My guess is the two top options the City is looking at are Certificates of Participation (investors receive a return based on lease revenues associated with the offering; in this case, the leasing of the Fairgrounds), or Revenue Bonds (typically used to finance income-producing projects). In both cases, bonds are repaid through revenues generated from activities on the property.
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