Students of history tell us about the three cataclysmic events that changed the course of human history.
The first was the fall of the Roman Empire and the Pax Romana as chronicled by Edward Gibbon. Rome fell because of corrupt and inept emperors and a gluttonous and indifferent citizenry that failed to recognize the imminent threat posed by the barbarians. Rome’s failure ushered in the medieval Dark Ages.
The second was the Black Death pandemic in the 14th century. An estimated 75 million to 200 million people died. The pathogen was probably a bacterium, Yersinia pestis. The results of that plague had religious, social and economic effects for centuries on human history.
The third is the calamity of the rehabilitation of Concord’s Main Street.
The Main Street project is a colossal waste of taxpayers’ money. From the beginning, I believed that it was going to become too expensive, would not deliver on the promises of its designers and there would never be any reliable data to support the premise of “build it and they will come.”
Current evidence supports my position. We finally have built it, and it was completed last month. There is no discernible improvement in the economic health of the Main Street community.
The city manager’s Fiscal Year 2017 Budget Transmittal Letter (page 14, first paragraph under chart-tax base) paints a grim picture of any meaningful increase in Main Street property values in the near future. Using his statistics, I came up with an anemic .004 percent growth in assessed value of the city tax base.
If the new Main Street economy is as vibrant as some describe it, when can we expect to see an increase in Main Street property values?
The city’s custodial and maintenance costs for the first year of our newly completed Main Street is $350,000, with anticipated increases in subsequent years.
In order to raise $350,000 through property taxes, the assessed value of Concord properties would need to be increased by approximately $13 million. That is if the full $27-plus per thousand of your property taxes are used to pay for Main Street maintenance costs. If only the city portion of your property taxes are used to pay for maintenance costs, assessments would have to increase by approximately $40 million!
Extrapolated data from an analysis of future Main Street maintenance costs predict that in 20 years the costs may rise to $1 million a year unless some dramatic changes in policy and more fiscal restraints are enacted.
In a non-scientific survey that I conducted while chatting with ordinary citizens about our new Main Street, some were pleased and others were critical.
The over-65 crowd thinks it looks beautiful. Some of these people are retired. Others may not pay Concord property taxes. Many live out of town.
Others think that our new Main Street is a legacy project, built to massage the tender egos of some local politicians.
Some commented on the ineptitude in designing parts of our new Main Street. That has now become part of the discussion of the current condition of our city parking fund. It is hemorrhaging money.
Losing some revenue generating parking spaces in the redesign of North Main Street was not a bright idea.
The city administration tried to solve the insolvency of the parking funds by punishing Main Street customers with huge parking increases and fines. That failed.
It now appears that part of the parking fund deficit will come from the general fund.
Somewhere there is a little black book filled with all of the recent traffic issues caused by the road design deficits in our new Main Street. Every day, someone is causing a traffic mess by parallel parking on the narrow roadway, tight parking spaces or a delivery truck that has no place to park.
I have spoken with many senior citizens who get confused about where to cross on our new Main Street and how to deal with those dangerous bricks in the crosswalks. Some make the ill-advised decision to jaywalk.
Illegal U-turns were as common as dirt on our old Main Street and they have now been developed into a fine art on our new Main Street. Drivers see a vacant parking spot on the opposite side of the street and make a dangerous U-turn.
There was supposed to be clarity in designing our new Main Street, not confusion.
The new Main Street saga is not finished. We still have the disposition of the city-owned former New Hampshire Employment Security building to deal with.
Some people believe that since the city council voted to spend over $1.5 million to bury the Main Street utility lines in front of that building, a deal may have been cooked up that will ensure that it is sold to local developers at a bargain basement price.
I am fearful that the city will never recoup our $2 million tax dollar investment in that building.
Then there is the Concord Steam fiasco on Main Street. I sometimes wonder if the right hand knows what the left hand is doing.
It’s time to pull the plug on any further taxpayer funding for Main Street projects. If $14 million is not enough, what amount is? $20 million? $30 million? The sky’s the limit?
Merchants’ and other Main Street businesses’ interests must now do their part in revitalizing our downtown.
Dramatic new initiatives are needed to encourage customers to return who may have left Main Street during the two-year construction period. Some may never return, bitter because of the detours, road construction and parking hassles.
The development of the upper floors in our classic Main Street buildings into high-end residential condos and apartments is a splendid idea that needs to be taken seriously. Those new units would contribute to the Main Street property tax base and help to defray the maintenance costs of Main Street.
If our new Main Street falters, it won’t be because the taxpayers of Concord didn’t do their job. They have been more than generous in helping our Main Street survive.
The blame will rest squarely on the shoulders of those who have the most to lose: the merchants, landlords and other businesses on Main Street.
There are still lots of vacant and under-rented retail spaces on Main Street. That does not bode well for the early optimistic hopes that an economic renaissance will soon appear.
Apologists for the initial lackluster appraisal of the economic benefits of the $14 million tax dollars invested in our new Main Street point to the many improvements, including the romantic effect of those new street lights.
Those lights could have been installed at a small fraction of the cost of the final construction bill of Main Street, along with the other beautification projects, and we could have kept our original classic four-lane roadway.
The paint is hardly dry on our new Main Street and already the city administration is embarking on a program of more huge mega-expensive traffic projects, including the Storrs Street extension and more traffic roundabouts.
People are getting construction fatigue. No matter where you travel in Concord, a street is closed, traffic is diverted, all in the name of progress.
The one bright note in all of this is the decision by the city council to scrap the plans to torture Loudon Road. It would have been a disastrous repeat of Main Street.
City Hall appears oblivious to all of these issues. It’s business as usual. Tax and spend our way to prosperity.
So there you have it folks: $14 million tax dollars later and counting, and Main Street is in no better economic shape than it was before we turned the first shovel of dirt.
You can’t take beauty to the bank.
(Jim Baer lives in Concord.)