Fact checkers often use a scale called ‘pinocchios’ to score the truthfulness of a newspaper article. No pinocchios is accurate. Four is the opposite.
One of the difficulties of running a truly independent campaign in a town with no newspaper is that the Council majority, and their allies, can easily swamp individuals like me simply by the quantity of negative campaigning and pinocchios.
You the public often won’t have the context to know what’s what on issues (like the Marina) which are decided over the course of many years. At most, only a few hundred people watch any given City Council meeting. Very few watch continuously. Only a handful will read the various documents we vote on.
To try to improve the situation, I write about all our meetings in my Weekly Updates. But even that requires time, which many of you do not have. Time is also a problem for me. Because it take a bunch of time to refute all these pinocchios. There are simply too many for one person.
Ten minutes…
So, I’m asking you to take a leap of faith with me. Look at just one issue: the Marina Hotel proposal. It will take about ten minutes to watch the video and read the rest of this article. Do so with an open mind. And then, believe me when I tell you the thing which took me years of attending meetings to figure out:
The City handles every planning decision in exactly the same way.
If you watch and read this one thing, you will have a basic understanding of how the City handles everything. And you’ll understand what this election is about.
A question from an audience member 1:11:45
I would like to know what your stance is on the hotel in the Marina. Personally that would be taking away the parking lot for my family to go enjoy the Marina and the concerts in the park and the fishing and Quarterdeck. Also you’ve already addressed that we can’t even keep restaurants, so what are we going to do with these people who come stay at the hotel, if we have nothing in the city to offer them.
I respond, then there are responses from Rob Back and Jeremy Nutting.
Rob Back 1:13:31
There was misinformation that floated my opponent. He brought that information out and it got everybody in a panic. The pier that’s at our Marina was built in 1980 and that was built with uh it’s called rco funding, Recreation and conservation office grant funding and that grant funding specifically states that that north parking lot cannot be built on on it’s for the use of the pier now as far as any idea of a hotel elsewhere the big question mark is a lot of the uh land where the marina sits was acquired through eminent domain and that restricts you can’t just turn around to
let a private developer do that so yes the idea of the hotel has been floated uh some of that was a little bit of a surprise to me but uh there was misinformation that a hotel could even be built on the north parking lot and that’s from the the former Harbor Master I had a long conversation with him so uh that was not even a possibility so I’m sorry for those of you that thought that that could have happened.
Jeremy Nutting 1:14:31
Thank you for the question. Yes, that was brought up in Council it was talked about in Municipal facilities committee and in the economic development committee. The possibility of anything being being built in the north bulkhead is next to Impossible. Conventional construction cannot happen there there would. It’s all fill. It’s cost prohibited for anybody to build on the north parking lot. Yes we did pass the okay for the $25 million for the bonds for the um connectivity from uh downtown to the marina um but as far as any public funds going to a um any any kind of construction uh it’s not going to happen thank you.
Four Pinocchios on the Marina Hotel
But as you can see from the image at the top of this article, I spread no ‘misinformation’ on the Marina Hotel proposal. It was actually those two people on the dais doing so.
- I simply recorded and shared the information presented to the community at a public meeting on September 27, 2022 by the Mayor, City Manager and Skylab, the designer of our various Marina proposals.
- Anyone who attended that meeting saw, with their own eyes, exactly what I did, the Mayor, City Manager and Skylab (our paid designer) telling the audience that the plan now was to move the hotel from Parcel A over to the in the north parking lot.
- This proposal was a complete surprise to at least a few people on the City Council. But obviously not to the Mayor, City Manager and the paid designer from Skylab.
- The proposal was never mentioned at any committee or full council meeting before then.
- The only authorisation the Council ever gave the developer was to develop a hotel at the back of the Marina (Parcel A) in November 2021–nine months before that community meeting (see image below.)
- After signing that agreement in November 2021 (and this is also on the recording of the community meeting), it was the developer who proposed moving it to the North Parking Lot sometime at the beginning of 2022.
- However, the City did not inform the Council of that dramatic change or ask for a vote to alter our agreement. They simply went ahead, with Skylab, to develop the new (surprise) proposal which was presented to the public at that community meeting.
- And remember, the City paid the designer to prepare that new public presentation. So a certain amount of back and forth work between the City, the developer and Skylab was going on for many months before the ‘big reveal’.
- Therefore, it is totally irrelevant whether or not it was ‘possible’ to build on the North Parking Lot. Because there was never any permission to do so.
The entire Marina Redevelopment process has been as unhealthy as gone like this for many years. Not just the original Parcel A proposal in November 2021. Not just the surprise move to the North Parking Lot in September 2022. And not even the way it was canceled in January 2023 which made it sound as though it was the City’s idea all along.
It’s bad enough when we mislead the public as we have. But Mr. Back and Mr. Nutting are now attempting to re-write history.
We handle every major decision like this.
I have always supported public engagement and transparency
In September 2021, the Council approved my proposal for a Marina Virtual Town Hall portal, to inform the public as to all aspects of the project. I knew this would not be a single project, but many projects and that it would be changing. The idea was to keep it continuously updated as to any changes as the discussion evolved. We budgeted the money but never spent it.
I hope you will support my efforts towards better public engagement and transparency. I believe we make better choices when there are no surprises.
JC I am letting every one I talk with to vote for JC.. However your non support of the Sky bridge and the concerns about Police numbers are bigger issues . I can see how they twist so many facts and issues and take no real responsibility for problems and clearing up same . Stay strong , answer as simply and clearly and Hang On . I am trying and so is Eddie . People do ask me who to vote for . Kaylene
I support TWELVE PERMANENT police staff increases. The majority voted for TWO TEMPORARY positions, which run out of money next year. They are simply fibbing as to our PD levels. We used to have TWELVE MORE. TWELVE MORE. TWELVE MORE. I want MORE. They want to keep what we -have-.
They Skybridge was a free gift to Wesley. Sorry. Not Sorry. We’ve given them MILLIONS. Financially they are larger than the entire City of Des Moines. They should be giving -us- money. Rob’s claim that they ‘gave’ us City Hall is -false-. I understand how people feel, but the money we give their corporation does not affect your neighbours at Wesley, but it -is- money we don’t have for families.
Thank you for your continued support.
JC,
I appreciate your candor. I also would like MORE police and NO hotel. Or if we do have a hotel, use the old Masonic bldg. It’s beautiful, has beautiful grounds and views. It’s close enough to town to bring in revenue and we wouldn’t be destroying our marina.
My only suggestion to you (and this may help your bid for office) pleaase, be more positive and less combative. It isn’t flattering on you and puts a bad taste in peoples mouth. No one enjoys it.
I will be voting for you but please, take these words in. Hear them.
RH
Hi,
1. MORE police. Permanent funding. The temporary funding we have runs out next year.
2. I agree that the Masonic Home needs to be saved!!!! I tried very hard to get a community organisation going. Unfortunately, the Council is now prevented from working on this until the developer re-engages.
3. At the risk of sounding defensive. (I am hearing you.)
a. I really -do- try to be positive. I do not enjoy ‘combat’ at ALL. However, as an example, I felt there was no ‘nice’ way to stop bad things like the hotel. I didn’t want to simply ‘object’. I wanted to STOP it. It’s outrageous. So I felt it is appropriate to be outraged. Also, these decisions evolve over a very long time. It wasn’t -one- decision. This has been brewing for -years-. There was no way to get people’s attention without shouting for month and month after month until it started to -click- with enough people. That’s always been the problem here. I’ve had several predecessors who wanted to change similar -very- bad things, but they were simply too -polite-. And so the public did not understand the seriousness of the situation. If you’re too quiet when there’s a fire, nobody hears you.
b. That said, and I’m not kidding, if you notice any specific things that you find annoying, -please- let me know. I have a -very- thick skin. 🙂 (206) 878-0578
Thank you for the input,