Board of Aldermen 12-28-2021 Page 18
actually given their property to the city for $1. That kind of thing does happen and if this is that valuable to the city, there's
no reason why we can't give the Mayor the right to at least negotiate or speak with some authority on the issue.
| did not receive a lot of comments on this. | received one that said no and | received one that said yes. So | think the
discussion needs to be there. We shouldn't shut it down and we certainly can't wait. If this is gonna go, it's going to go
and we have to have a say in what happens. In that case, what I'll do is | will vote yes on this because as someone who
said earlier I'd like to look like a genius on this and | think that that's a value. Thank you.
Alderman Klee
Thank you Alderman Schmidt. Even if you voted no, you still look like a genius but thank you. I'd like to kind of address
some of the concerns on 203. I'm sorry 202 was tabled without discussion at the Budget Committee and | understood the
reason for it. We didn't have at that point, | believe, the developer said that he wasn't going to back out. Since then he
has (inaudible). That being said, there was no discussion at the Budget Committee because like here, it was tabled
without discussion. So | just want to get that out on the table.
Why push this as quickly as we did? The main reason for pushing it as quickly as we did was because there was that
pending. Truthfully, | probably would not have necessarily come forward once all of them had started except the
developer at that time stood in front of 50 people at least in my Ward at Hunt Memorial and he very, very openly said if the
city is interested in buying this, | will step away. He said that. | spoke to Director Cummings. | said to Director Cummings
what do | have to do to move this forward? We needed to come up with a figure for a bond so he spoke to the developer.
We also told the developer that if we did purchase it, he'd already put out some money, that we would try to keep him
whole. He would have to show and prove exactly what it was that he had put out and if it was justifiable, we would include
it based on the price that he spoke to Director Cummings about and that we came up with a $2.5 million. This was why
and how we came up with that number. | didn't pull it out of the air. | didn't go and get an assessment. | didn't do
anything. It has real backing. That's why we came up with that money.
We're kidding ourselves. If we don't think that there are other developers waiting in the wings, every good business
person is going to have someone there that's going to want to do it. If the city does not show that they're willing to
negotiate in good faith, if they won't show that we give the Mayor the authorization to at least talk to him, and yes we've
done this without having approved here at the Board and then we scramble. That's what we do. We approve the bond
way too often without approving the authorization and that's why | put both them in at the same time. It was so that we
didn't have to say okay well we got this bond now we're going to get approval. They go hand in glove, but they can be
separated. It's a done deal as far as the 202 and the 2.5 but that doesn't mean that we can't have the Mayor sit and
negotiate and let's think of us as individuals selling our home. Wouldn't you prefer number one is the person who comes
and talks to you, I'd love to know that they've already been pre-approved for whatever amount of money we're going to
negotiate and I'd like to know that they have the ability and the will to be able to negotiate? So why would | waste my
time.
| can't speak to the family and the letter that came from the developer didn't speak to the family either. He basically said
that he was willing to walk away. He said you need housing, you need green space. He was a man of his word. | truly,
truly appreciate everything he said and what he did.
| wrote notes as everybody was talking so | apologize if I'm kind of like scrambling and looking at things. | Know one of the
things were and | agree with what Alderman Jette had said. | saw the in Greeley Park. | saw the signs sitting at Greeley
Park and if you'd notice, every single time | speak, | say it is not in Greeley Park. It abuts Greeley Park and I've made that
very, very clear and I've made it very clear to the people who went out and spoke to it as being inside Greeley Park. | said
to them if you do that, people are going to stop trusting you. You have to be honest and you have to be transparent.
So | think in their zell, you know, being very, very passionate about it, they looked at it as - and | think someone actually
described it as when you look at the whole thing it looks like it's in an eye often and | know it kind of sounds disgusting
referring to it as being in the armpit of Greeley Park because there's this big huge portion of it here and there’s a little
piece that comes a little back kind of towards the neck that goes up to Colombia.
So as far as Camp Doucette and other areas that we haven't saved, I'm sorry that we didn't save Camp Doucette. It
probably would have been a very good property to save. | agree we cannot purchase every green space in the city. This
one is a little different. This one truly is going to affect and it's a piece of a puzzle that fits right in here and that's why I'm
disappointed that 202 went down but it is what it is and it's the will of the Board. | will abide by it even if this one goes
down too but I'd like you to think long and hard to give permission - and | don't believe it is a blank check. | think it's a
negotiation tool where the family or whoever it is that's going to be working with the Mayor and economic development
has that ability to have that backing. It's a little bit stronger than just, you know, if | can get that - as it is, they're gonna say
