By: Diane Benjamin
See this story is you forgot: https://blnnews.com/2022/04/24/69-million-for-water-projects-so-you-wont-notice-the-cii-east-giveaways/
That story is from last April. I was in Downtown Bloomington yesterday. Many of the roads are new, the flowers pots are gorgeous, and the raised beds have actually been taken care of.
I don’t see why downtown needs a streetscape plan since by day there are a bunch of lawyers and people going to court and at night the bars flourish. I didn’t see a lot of people, Uptown had many but of course they have a college.
Downtown looks much better now than it did. Who does Bloomington think will flock to the new walkable downtown for the now invisible development? Are you going to drive to downtown, park in garage, and walk around downtown? The Farmer’s Market is big, anything else?
Meanwhile the CII East property hasn’t changed much. Somebody pulled the huge weeds from the flower boxes, but soon they will need to do it again:
This isn’t the only eyesore downtown. A streetscape plan won’t fix empty buildings or remove all the asbestos in them and underground.
Bloomington is now going to start looking for grants. Don’t worry, they aren’t tax dollars. 😫
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A slick new streetscape would sure help increase private owner’s property values downtown – Tari’s Friends™️ would certainly be happy about that.
Until they get the property tax bill
Will their friends advocate for 20-25 years (or whatever the maximum) where the property tax increases are abated and given back to them to enrich the properties for themselves?
It’s like claiming $10k payments within 90 days of an election to certain people that tend to vote Democratic are necessary and won’t increase debt or inflation.
Where’s the arsonist aiding downtown redevopment back in the 1980’s? LOL that’s the first thing I thought of. Let things naturally take place. It’s God’s plan.
Downtown BL, what a joke! Then to spend $750,000 for a street scape plan. Taxpayers should be outraged for this wasteful spending.