In light of his most recent comments on employment, wonder if Mark Vitner still thinks Uptown will hit the 100,000 jobs needed to make CATS $9.5 billion transit system work?
“I don’t want to sugarcoat it,” said Mark Vitner, an economist for Wachovia in Charlotte. “We just drove right through the guard rail and went off the side of the mountain.” … “Very few people are going to escape the wrath of this downturn,” Vitner said.
Vitner, recall, initially expressed skepticism that Uptown could generate the job footprint CATS’ plans required. But when I pointed out Vitner’s position during the 2007 debate on the transit tax repeal, he quickly reversed course and penned an op-ed for the Uptown paper, throwing his full support behind CATS’ building spree.
Now, confronted with indisputable evidence that the local economy has permanently altered its growth trajectory, the Power That Be refuse to reign in spending plans. A $400m. streetcar is being fast-tracked by city staff with zero push-back from a clueless city council which should screaming to delay capital projects, not accelerate them.
And speaking of capital projects, here is County Commissioner Bill James pointing out that the ratings agencies are getting wise to Mecklenburg County’s financial strain. Debt ratings are almost certain to fall, resulting in yet higher debt service cost, unless both the city and county conform spending to the new economic reality.
They won’t.
Bonus Observation: Check out the Chamber-heavy spin local Realtors continue to subject themselves to — why? “Selling Charlotte” is irrelevant when potential buyers are locked into out-of-town, upsidedown mortgages and there are no jobs to relo into.
