About the revenue shortfall for the city that started in early 2007, and which caught city officials by 'surprise:'
BAD SHOW.
Look, I started this blog in December, 2006, and I was a relative latecomer. It was pretty clear to anyone paying attention that there was going to be a slowdown, if it hadn't already started.
I know that both Paul-doh and I blogged the irony of the city raising their fee structure just as building was slowing.
This is going to sound harsh, but the only explanation to me is that city officials and media were so close to the real estate community, which was desperate to keep the illusion of the ever expanding Bend alive, that they simply refused to see what was happening. They saw the housing bubble bloggers as alarmists, and preferred to believe the "Bend is Different" folk.
This is a case where I can't let them off the hook, because I was actively blogging about these very issues at the same time this was going on, and it took an extremely obtuse mentality to not see the slowdown coming. Hell, they had access to the real numbers, which were clearly showing a slowdown, but they kept guzzling the kool-aid.
I've said it recently; they need to scale back their grandiose plans, and concentrate in building some available industrial land, or even more basic, fill the huge number of potholes we're going to have.
Hint to the city planners: we're about to have a bunch of potholes. Don't let it be a surprise.
BAD SHOW.
Look, I started this blog in December, 2006, and I was a relative latecomer. It was pretty clear to anyone paying attention that there was going to be a slowdown, if it hadn't already started.
I know that both Paul-doh and I blogged the irony of the city raising their fee structure just as building was slowing.
This is going to sound harsh, but the only explanation to me is that city officials and media were so close to the real estate community, which was desperate to keep the illusion of the ever expanding Bend alive, that they simply refused to see what was happening. They saw the housing bubble bloggers as alarmists, and preferred to believe the "Bend is Different" folk.
This is a case where I can't let them off the hook, because I was actively blogging about these very issues at the same time this was going on, and it took an extremely obtuse mentality to not see the slowdown coming. Hell, they had access to the real numbers, which were clearly showing a slowdown, but they kept guzzling the kool-aid.
I've said it recently; they need to scale back their grandiose plans, and concentrate in building some available industrial land, or even more basic, fill the huge number of potholes we're going to have.
Hint to the city planners: we're about to have a bunch of potholes. Don't let it be a surprise.