ROLDO: MMPI Escapes with Pockets Full

By Roldo Bartimole

What a wonderful deal!

Cuyahoga County paid MMPI of Chicago $3 million to get it out of its way on the convention center/medical mart. It was a bargain, officials aver.

Yet, somehow I feel as a county resident I got screwed. And so did you.

Why?

Because here’s what else MMPI walked away with:

– $333,333 a month for 30 months or $10,000,000.

– $83,333 in “supplemental rent” for 30 months or $2,500,000.

– $12,000,000 for a “developer” agreement payment.

– $4,000,000 in construction cost reserve.

– $1,354,730 for “operational expenses” (July-October).

For a total payments through October, 2013, of $29,854,730.

Add the $3,000,000 final payment to get them out of town and you have a neat cost of $32,854,730.

Not a bad paycheck for a firm that should have never been in town. Thank you, Tim Hagan.

The one thing, however, can be said that did bring the project in ahead of time and below cost. We’ll see how that works as it begins to operate.

The $3-million going-away gift, according to the Plain Dealer editorial board and thus the public’s watchdog, is okay. Easy for them to say.

It’s automatic approval at the PD. They acquiesce to power so easily. Likewise, says the editorial voice of the PD, is the city’s deal to give the Browns $30 million plus $12 million in extra sin taxes, in addition to all the other goodies headed to Jimmy Haslam’s business, is fine with them. Yes, easy to say.

Editorial bosses conservative Elizabeth Sullivan and right-winger Kevin O’Brien, of course, do not even mention this several hundred million dollar deal happens without a public vote. So much for democratic process and they’re past moaning about the County’s poor governance record.

The PD editors say nothing can be done because the city has a lease with the Browns. It suggests that no one ever breaks or revises a lease. What a quaint thought.

It also should be noted that Fred Nance of Squire-Sanders negotiated the Browns lease and now is general counsel to the Browns. He also remains the law firm’s regional manager partner here.

It may not surprise you then that Fred Nance was involved in the lease for the convention center with MMPI. He was the lead.

Seems all the work Nance does for the city and county ends up benefitting the people they do business with and then, in the case of the Browns, he becomes an executive of the city’s lessee. How awfully convenient.

It just seems to work out that way. Where’s the FBI when it’s really needed.

Where’s the PD editorialists when a big shot needs a public spanking. Off on coffee break.

Indeed, the Squire Sanders law firm has a rich history of screwing Clevelanders. For proof anyone can look to what the firm did to damage the city’s finances and its municipal light system.

Squire Sanders in the 1970s represented both CEI and the City of Cleveland. You don’t have to wonder which it served well and which it served badly. It tried to destroy the city’s electricity system.

So you can bet that the losses to the county will be more severe. And for longer than five years.

And MMPI won’t be around to blame.

Meanwhile, our earnest County officials are putting its citizens in much risky financial jeopardy by building and financing a 600 or so room hotel, which will likely lose more than $2.7 million a year if my guess means anything. It’ll be deficit hell.

The hotel will cost $270,330,000, the County claims.

Bonds of $206,650,000 will be let but that won’t cover the entire cost.

The word around has been that the County had some $93 million left over from the building of the med mart & convention center. However, the sources of funds listed in a document sent me by the county claims the residual from the mart/center at $38 million, some $55 million less.

It expects the city of Cleveland to subsidize $8,000,000; a sales tax exemption to provide $7,680,000; and an unnamed loan of another $10,000,000 will magically appear from a “public/private equity or private loan.”

All this is a bit shaky as the document notes: “All economic and cost models in this presentation are very preliminary and subject to change.”

You can bet on that.

Worse, this is based on a study authorized by Positively Cleveland, the county-financed but private convention bureau. That’s like asking the purveyors of a Ponzi scheme, “Will this make me rich?” Of course, you’ll be rolling in dough. Such nonsense.

Meanwhile, Mayor Frank Jackson, who voted against the original stadium legislation in the 1990s, quietly made his deal with short-change artist Jimmy Haslam. They didn’t announce it until after the election. It wouldn’t have made a difference since almost 80 percent of Cleveland voters didn’t bother to vote. Why should they have? Why waste time and effort.

They don’t need the Plain Dealer to tell them it’s a waste of time.

The depression in Cleveland isn’t just economic. The city’s morale is dismal.

And there’s not one sign of any change on the horizon.

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George Forbes Still Working the Deal

Can anyone believe that George Forbes has concern for either the citizens of Cleveland or East Cleveland when he proposes a merger of the two cities?

Could there be anyone naive enough to fall for a Forbes con?

I’ve never known George to be concerned about anyone but himself. I’ve known him a long, long time.

You can be assured that this move has something to do with land around University Circle that some developer already has in mind for development.

George is just clearing the path. For a price.

George wants to be the deal-maker to make the deal and collect whatever he can.

It’s how he operates.

Before he left office in 1989 he secretly put his client, the late Dick Jacobs, into the rich Chagrin Highland deal. Jacobs’s name was never mentioned in countless hours of discussion at City Council when the legislation was passed. But George knew.

It only became known after Michael White became mayor and servant of another of our charlatan developers – Sam Miller and Forest City – that White had the city sue Jacobs. (For details click here).

The dirty details came pouring out in depositions on the case, which never went to trial. However, the depositions – some 35 boxes – were public and hours at the courtroom revealed the secret deal in rich detail.

How could the Plain Dealer now report Forbes’s latest game without letting people know just what a scoundrel he is and warn against a deal with him involved?

Some Clevelanders may notice that Chagrin Highlands now has the Eaton Corp. massive office headquarters and University Hospital, both of which belong in Cleveland, paying Cleveland taxes.

Now Forbes and his law firm could be setting up another move to benefit some unknown developer. Unknown to the public but not Forbes.

Is this his last hurrah? I’d bet on it.

 

 

In 1991 he was awarded the Second Annual Joe Callaway Award for Civic Courage in Washington, D.C. He received the Distinguished Service Award of the Society of Professional Journalists, Cleveland chapter, in 2002, and was named to the Cleveland Journalism Hall of Fame, 2004. [Photo by Todd Bartimole.]

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