Tax rev vs Meridens well being

[Chriss P]

Just noticed the below blog. I thought the plant was neeeded for energy and not tax income. So its come to a point were Meriden is in dire need of tax revenue. Thats scary.

They need to go back to the roots do a complete audit of Meridens cash flow and see were thier money is going then. There has been past of slight mis-use of funds in Meriden. I feel if they work hard to see were thier money is going, they may find the tax base is not as serious as stated in the blog. I can't see the answer as simply building and ruining its open space. Look at research Parkway.

Blog quote:

All of this falls against the stark background of the city’s financial woes. Meriden is in serious need of tax revenue, and City Manager Lawrence Kendzior explained at Monday’s City Council meeting that tax increases are inevitable without tax income from development. Open spaces and the creatures and plants inhabiting them will never return once that land is flattened and rendered impermeable by a layer of concrete, but no one has figured out how to make a woody swamp, even a rather attractive one, into a tax generating asset.

[jaxma]

Chriss P-

How can you claim that the development of Research Parkway was the City "simply building and ruining its open space"? The companies in that development provide thousands of local jobs and contribute greatly to Meriden's tax base. Would you prefer that those jobs and revenue not exist? (It's rather utopian to believe that Meriden could have made an effort to remain an agrarian Jeffersonian society at any point during the past 150 years.)

Also, Meriden currently has more dedicated open space than at least the majority of communities in Connecticut. (Hubbard Park is in fact the largest municipal park in New England.) We should enjoy the resources that we have and celebrate the fact that they have been set aside for recreational use, whenever possible.

Cherrybarbs-

It's impossible to empathize with your statement above regarding the state of the City's budget. Non-educational expenditures were reduced last year, and have been proposed to be reduced even further for FY09. That hardly seems like a way to "bankrupt" an entity.

[Chriss P]

"How can you claim that the development of Research Parkway"

I used to live near there when Cuno was the only building (complete unspoiled wilderness). Plus I'm using an example that the city is getting a good tax basis from Research Parkway and other expansions and shouldn't need oodles more.

Meriden can do much better than a powerplant for increasing a tax basis, they just need to be more rational; and like I said they need to find out were the money is really going first. I have a feeling its not all going to proper spending.

I say get busy on the Meriden mall (Grants) building lot and do something nice with that. Meriden has a lot to raise taxes from and were its all going I don't know.

Brookside Park also as it appears abandoned and set aside exclusivly for thugs with all the debris and grafitti within it.

The area were Ames was could be a good expansion also.

Get some Meriden pride back to other areas besides Hubbard Park.