(116th in a series of posts on parking)
John Price is a forty-something resident of the forgotten far northeast Bethlehem. He is a computer nerd by day and political wonk and local government follower in the shadows of the night. A socially liberal, fiscal conservative in a world gone mad, he wonders if he is in danger of extinction.
Gadfly:
As someone who follows development in Bethlehem, I find the committee’s determination of “Nova Development has a stronger track record of project completion in the City of Bethlehem and a more desirable building design” to be laughable and wrong. Nova Development, to the best of my knowledge, has not completed 1 project in the City of Bethlehem, or anywhere. Scarcia and Allied Construction are the people behind Nova and are not developers but, rather, a construction company hired by developers like Ashley Development to build projects. They should not get credit for being hired by a developer to build a building. If that were the case, Boyle Construction and Butz Construction would be the best developers in the area.
Second, Peron and Petrucci each have a very strong track record in the City and Lehigh Valley. For the committee to allow personal animosities to cloud their judgment is ridiculous. CW Van Wirt should never have been on this committee since she has come out against the garage in the past. Heller and Karner have a dislike for former Mayor Callahan, whose company is involved.
Third, this is for Kizman, CRIZ uses state taxes not city taxes. So the City loses nothing, and will gain from an increased assessment on the property for taxes, as well as EIT and BPT taxes.
Fourth, Peron and Petrucci each control their own CRIZ land for other projects. They could easily transfer some of their acreage to the parcel. Nova would have included CRIZ, but they control none — because of that whole lack of developing anything from above.
Fifth, the committee’s dismissal of 20% of the CRIZ was short-sighted. 100% of the state taxes for that parcel will be CRIZ increment. 20% of that could mean significant income to the BPA.
Finally, from a BPA perspective, you make more $$$ from daily parking than monthly parking. While 75 spots vs 32 is a big difference. The hourly rate for this 43 spots should be included in your analysis. Even at $5 per day for 300 days per year, would $64,500 per year.
John
Is John Price expecting 100% occupancy for the garage in making his computation. It seems so. I do not think his comparison is sound.
I used $5 per day for 300 days (taking out Sundays and holidays), which I believe is 1/2 the price of the current maximum daily rate. Predicting income from the 43 spots is difficult since it’s not simply 43 vehicles. More than 1 vehicle could park in a spot per day. The south side also has more special events that would fill the garage that would need to be factored in.