Gunpowder Chronicle posted on April 7, 2008 9:04 PM | Rating:
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Okay, I have received a somewhat cryptic email from one of those "temporary addresses" you can use to prevent getting spammed, so I can't confirm any of this information. And since I have been known, on occasion, to refer to the Mayor of Salisbury as a "ratfucker", I don't think I can get confirmation there, either.
The jist of the email is this: Royal Farms has more or less bailed on the location at this point because the City of Salisbury is looking for $300,000 (yes that is THREE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS) for improvements to the intersection of Pemberton Drive and Parsons Road.
Normally, I would say "hmm... that seems responsible". But in the case, I don't think so. Why?
Well, Royal Farms would create jobs. Not top-of-the-line, high salary jobs. But jobs that would, frankly, be good for a lot of those West Side youth with few other opportunities for "starter jobs". Let's face it, most kids under the age of 25 today have a work ethic that sucks like a White House Intern. These types of starter jobs are great for them.
And Royal Farms would be produce tax revenue -- both sales tax (which helps cover the teat the City sucks on from the state) and real property tax (which the City desperately needs, given the amount of land in the limits not on the tax rolls).
But let's compare that... to the Salisbury Mall TIF. Those bonds, right now, are costing the City of Salisbury money. Those bonds are issued based on the value the land will have in the future. A future where substantial development will have taken place, and where that development will have added value to the land. That is how TIFs work. Yet the land sits idle, mired in a lawsuit to force a breach of contract. No development is going on-- and until the economy improves substantially, none will. The only thing the citizens of the City of Salisbury got out of the little TIF escapade was (finally) getting the old Salisbury Mall torn down. That's it.
Maybe if Royal Farms would ask for a TIF, they could use that money to pay for the intersection improvements.
Now there is something to think about.