Affordable housing used to be a problem in CdA. Now, in this morning’s Press, Realtor Kim Cooper reports there are currently 348 single family homes listed in the CdA area for less than $150,000. That’s a price far below the projected cost of the “affordable” housing condos being discussed for the Mid-Town renovation and subsidized by public tax dollars through LCDC.
Any comments, questions or ideas?
So how did the condo auction at Riverstone turn out? I drove by yesterday afternoon, and there appeared to be quite a few cars in the lot and people walking toward the units.
Comment by Bill — May 24, 2009 @ 11:00 am
The Cop Shop is open! I have a report from one of their first visitors down in City Park. The other day I saw some city employees working on the structure. Apparently it’s open for business. And not a moment too soon!
Comment by Dan — May 24, 2009 @ 11:13 am
Dan, yes it opened Saturday. And today on the radio I heard a couple of officers check out at the “park office,” so I assume they meant the bunker.
The representation made by Childers and Tymesen to the LCDC was the City would repay the LCDC for half in February 2009. I reviewed the February and March LCDC minutes but found no specific mention of the City’s making repayment. Does anyone know if that happened?
Comment by Bill — May 24, 2009 @ 11:22 am
Honestly, what can $150,000 buy you?
A McCrap shack on a postage stamp lot?When I last worked construction
back in 2000-2001, the median price of a home was around $111,000.We built homes that sold anywhere from $75,000 to over $200,000 back then.I think the Real Estate market will remain stagnant for many years IMO.
The lack of good jobs in the area remains a concern.
Anyway, Mayor Bloem and her braintrust decided that moving well-off people into the CDA area was the way to go and many of these people are only partime residents.So, they had LCDC help to fund most of the condos we see built.Sure well-off people create jobs and frequent shops and pay higher property taxes than the average resident.But,having the rich set move in, also creates an affordable housing problem and raises our property taxes.So, it’s a double-edged sword, your damned if you do and your damned if you don’t.
Dixie Reed once said, that having well-off partime residents in Kootenai county was “a good deal”.A
good deal for whom Dixie? The city or
the stakeholders? You? I’m glad Dixie that your house probably only cost you $26,000 back 40 years ago,
but what about the younger generations? Don’t they deserve to own a home too?
Comment by kageman — May 24, 2009 @ 12:30 pm
A friend of mine commented that the young people today want everything today without having to save for it.
There once was a time people moved into “starter homes” which were often fixer uppers. They would gradually make improvements. Now society is catering to a new generation that is accustomed to immediate gratification.
It was this attitude, coupled with easy credit, that got us into the housing collaspe.
Kageman, no one “deserves to own a home.” The U.S. Constitution up holds the right for the “pursuit of happiness”, not the right to happiness or the right to own your own home.
When government manipulates the market place, as did Congress with easy credit at Fannie and Freddy, results can be negative. The government created a situation that fueled the rapid inflation of housing, making it difficult to save for a home. Then it collasped.
The manipulation of the City and LCDC articially help increased supply of over priced downtown condos. The result was a price collaspe.
They then aided developers in commercial real estate. That collasped.
Why do they think they can do better manipulating low cost housing? I can envision one result…the fixer uppers never being bought to fix up because of the over supply of “affordable housing” subsidizied by taxpayers. This is a formula for creating deteriorating neighborhood. New generations are needed to revitilize old neighborhoods.
Comment by citizen — May 25, 2009 @ 7:44 am
I read that Safco Construction will be asking LCDC for $19,000 to double the P.I.O., Dennis Spencer, hours from three Monday through Friday – June through October – to six hours per day. Mr. Spencer’s pay is the responsibility of his employer, Safco Construction, not the taxpayers. Renata Mc Leod was the city’s project manager for the library and should certainly be involved in keeping the businesses informed.
Comment by Susie Snedaker — May 25, 2009 @ 8:10 am
Citizen: the LCDC helped accelerate the affordable housing “crisis” by adding fuel to the fire. Easy government money helped turn the building boom into an explosion. After all, the LCDC’s mission was to build high-end condos. They say otherwise, but you just have to look around to see the truth. Because there is no vision, they were unaware of the impact they were having. As you said, they were after the immediate gratification: seeing monster condos in downtown was more important to them than the negative side affects for the citizens they were elected to serve.
Comment by Dan — May 25, 2009 @ 9:33 am
Susie: Is anyone on the council fiscally responsible? Does anyone look after our money? The 2008 audit report presented to the city last month said that their revenue would be DOWN by 40% this year. FORTY PERCENT. Are these people trying to bankrupt the city? If not, then they’re going to bankrupt us when they grab foregone taxes with both hands!
Comment by Dan — May 25, 2009 @ 9:35 am
I think Susie is referring to this story from yesterday’s Press.
This doesn’t make sense. Safco apparently bid the job and won it, but now Safco is asking the LCDC to dip into its bottomless bucket-o-cash and double the money paid to an information flack. What’s changed since Safco submitted its bid? They haven’t even broken ground yet, but by some process not defined in the article Safco has determined it needs to use the info flack for twice as many hours per day? What do they know now that they didn’t know when they prepared their bid?
Comment by Bill — May 25, 2009 @ 10:02 am
I agree with Kageman that $150,000 doesn’t buy much of a house, but it’s a place to start. Our first house wasn’t much either, but we worked on it and sold it for a small profit, moving up bit by bit, the old fashioned way: By earning it. Citizen was right on by reminding us that old neighborhoods are revitalized by this method of fiscal responsibility and personal initiative.
Handing out subsidies to solve a problem they caused by the misuse of public tax dollars to begin with is a travesty that seems to line up with what our federal government is doing right now too.
Comment by mary — May 25, 2009 @ 10:54 am
The world is so crazy I hardly recognize it. What has happened to common sense?
Mary, these things are so clear that it is driving me crazy that people do not understand.
Can a Democracy continue when the voters don’t vote, and so many of the people that vote don’t know for what they are voting.
Comment by citizen — May 25, 2009 @ 11:38 am
I think all we can do is to talk and explain and inform; we must continue to speak up to our fellow citizens and our government. It’s not a quick fix, and can be depressing and discouraging, but what are the alternatives? To give up our freedoms? Our way of life?
Comment by mary — May 25, 2009 @ 1:23 pm
Thanks Mary, I needed that. I guess we just straighten up and move against the tide.
Comment by citizen — May 25, 2009 @ 6:22 pm
Yep, but we’re in this together, Citizen, and together we make an awesome force. We just need to realize that!
Comment by mary — May 25, 2009 @ 6:51 pm
Well, I’ll grant you, it was during the horse and buggy era. Our first house cost a whopping $17,000. It was brand new and really quite nice. Over the years we re-modeled and added rooms and a pool. When we sold, we received what I then considered an almost obscene profit. Recently, I found this house on my computer and discovered that the value now is $700,000. Kind of blows your mind doesn’t it? My point, you never can tell what will happen with a so called starter house. And hey, first time buyers here can have a fancy condo with a (choke) Riverstone lake view for under $200,000. Don’t knock starter houses, everyone must start somewhere.
Comment by Faringdon — May 26, 2009 @ 8:31 am