The Dayton Dragon [1]s are one of the most successful minor league sports operations in the country. They are located downtown.
So when “local” State Rep and House Speaker, Jon Husted (R-Kettering?) says the following:
Husted said the interchange is the county’s best chance to see much needed growth in jobs and sales tax revenues.
“We have been trying to make downtown a destination site my whole life that I’ve been here and it gets worse and worse and worse, because people don’t want to go there,” Husted said.
via Proposal for Austin Pike arena runs out of time in 2008 [2].
Either he knows something that no one else knows, or he’s clueless, since he really lives in Columbus and is facing an investigation into his residency.
No one comes to UD Flyer games either Jon- another prime location for an ice arena. If you think Jon needs to better understand that he works for us- not the developers looking to make a quick buck from your tax dollars- feel free to write: Jon Husted [3]
Interesting that he feels compelled to disqualify a downtown site.
It is almost as if he was directly answering all of us who commented on his blog about this Austin Road debacle.
http://jonhusted.wordpress.com/2008/11/06/the-recent-elections/
It is time to end this madness of irresponsibly using our tax dollars to subsidize green field sprawl development. Despite what some people think, downtown is NOT dead and with some better-targeted investment and more effective leadership, it will thrive.
I happen to agree. If no county monies were headed for the project, just the smaller cities/townships funded the whole thing well then I would not care (as much.)
Downtown would be fine for the arena – it is an easy drive up 75 for those south. The one lady said it was not convenient – well you may actually have to drive more than 4 blocks to get to somewhere in this county – sorry. We don’t need every little last thing in our own backyards. Mass transit, even busing, will not work. People like their cars, it is their independence. This is not NY or Chicago – get used to it and deal with THE DRIVE.
We need to realize two important things. FIRST – MOST people in Ohio want to live outside of the main city – suburbs are what people want. SECOND – The main city in every county, ie Dayton in this example, is needed for identification purposes, pride purposes, etc. People don’t say they are from Oakwood Ohio when they are in Paris, they say Dayton Ohio. With that THOSE who live there(in this case south of town) need to concede big county project to the core city – this way it benefits the core and you still have the amenities of a nice arena with a short drive. Other projects, like the Greene, fall into that category as well. As far as I am concerned The Greene is in Greene Co, and they can do what they want with their county.
It is time to think about where we began and why this place even exist. Things change, but we need to be adults about projects like this.
Something Gene said brought back World War II memories of life in the Army. I often hollered out “Anybody here from Boston?” I meant the city of Boston, not Brookline or Newton or Salem because I lived in Boston proper. It infuriated me when these suburban types cried out, “Me, me!” They weren’t.
Good news- Jon isn’t going to run for Governor in 2010 against Ted.
http://blog.cleveland.com/openers/2008/12/husted_rules_out_run_for_gover.html
I don’t think Dad got my point. And this is why people are going towards the “me” city…………. you may not understand the full scope of the problem. Dayton loses in all scenarios.
Thankfully the state turned down the hotel tax increase that Montgomery County Commisoners pushed for! It would have been one of the highest in the country. I though we where trying to attract people and jobs to this area of No-OHIO.
Ohio Representative Jon Husted Investigation
http://constitutionalfights.blogspot.com/2009/01/ohio-representative-jon-husted.html