![]() Christmas in Virginia Beach:
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Christmas Poem without any cheer; Read it, weep and cry in your beer!'Twas the time before Christmas
and all through the city, They smiled, giggled, and shouted
with glee. You come in with a plan, walk out
with the money, But we all know the dirty little
secrets how they use our money, The developers of the town center
that nobody wanted, With plans less stable than
quicksand in a movie, For subsidized housing we'll all
be town center slaves, Merry Christmas from Spore, et al! |
So...Bah Humbug city employees. You are no longer important. In fact, the city thinks you are not worthy of any special compensation for your hard work, dedication, and loyalty. Instead the money you would have gotten has been paid by the city to shore up deals with convicts, companies under investigation, and aid one guy who left two public jobs after sexual harassment allegations were made against him. And every other fly-by-night scheme snake oil salesmen could get Jim Spore to look at.
For example, lest you forget. The city sold one piece of public property to a company for $1.5 million $4.5 million less than the city had paid for it. The company was supposed to build an office complex that would attract high paying jobs (don't they all say that?) starting in June. No construction has started to date. Forget that Christmas present.
The city has spend 10s of $1,000s of dollars to try to launch the development careers of two ex-convicts wanting to build a 4-star luxury Marriott Hotel at 31st Street. Forget that Christmas present. But wait? Will Jim Spore get the council to use the employees retirement fund and taxpayer dollars in lieu of the franchise to launch the project? Don't bet against Spore on this one. He's in too deep to get out.
And watch out for the project at the so-called Town Center. You won't believe how much money and how little benefit the citizens will get from this subsidized housing development. Given without competitive bidding to a company acknowledged to be (maybe still is) under federal investigation, the plans seems to change quicker than the council can read the "Memorandums of Misunderstanding" which vary from week to week. The concept of this project is less stable than quicksand. Forget that Christmas present.
In fact, forget all the Christmas presents if you are a city employee or law abiding citizen, Spore's Follies have seen to it, there's nothing in the stocking for you this year.
For a merrier Christmas next time:
Pass it on! Email this to all your friends and anyone you know who works for the city. Tell everyone you know. Report government fraud, waste and abuse to Virginia News Source.
We will treat all communications confidentially. We'll never tell anyone by whom we've been contacted.
We may not be able to stop the fraud, waste, and abuse, but we will expose it and let the citizens have a shot at it on election day.
Call 757-340-4686 or email deepthroat@virginianewssource.com