Friday, March 16, 2012

Anyone Notice How The News & Record Leaves The Rest Of Greensboro Out Of The Conversation Concerning The Greensboro Performing Arts Center?

Allen Johnson, Editorial Page Editor for the Greensboro News & Record would be lying if he made the claim that he doesn't know about the effort to bring the performing arts center to the very neighborhood he grew up in. The proof is in the Tiny URL that is contained in this letter to the editor submitted by Professor David Wharton. But in his own editorial blog post, How's that arts center task force thingy working for us so far?, Allen Johnson conveniently leaves out any mention of his old neighborhood.

Could it be Allen no longer cares about the very neighborhood he grew up in? And how can Allen write the following without mention of the very neighborhood in which he grew up? Or any other Greensboro neighborhood?

"But, again, none of this is surprising. Nor is it unhealthy. This should be a rich, open and vigorous conversation, and not all of it has to take place in task force meetings.

That said, the participants should trust the process and try to keep open minds. There’s a lot of critical fact-finding to come. My only cautionary advice is that task force members need to talk to each other as well as the media and the community.

But so far, so good. Being inclusive builds trust and familiarity and squelches conspiracy theories before they can take root."

In case you're wondering why there is an effort to build a downtown performing arts center you need look no farther that this explanation by Bill Heasley to the City Council on Feb. 21:

"A small, yet highly organized group, the special interest representing the notional proposition of building a performing arts center, would very much like to place a bond on the ballot for voters to approve or disapprove regarding such performing arts center.

The bond becomes the cash-conduit for economic rent seeking of taxpayer dollars by special interests via politico enablers leading to crony capitalism. Yes, the wonderful world of public choice theory. James M. Buchanan of George Mason University defined public choice theory as “politics without the romance”.

One must note that the bond is by no means going to appear on the ballot due to spontaneous order/emergent order/ grass roots clamoring for a performing arts center. The bond will appear due to a special interest through political enablers. The notional proposition is for collective action to build a performing arts center for the enjoyment of the very-select-few. That is, the plans of the few vs. the plans of the many."

Like I said before, Tax the poor to entertain the rich.

Also, as I've said before:

"And should you be a first time visitor to this blog, please don't assume I'm against building a Greensboro Performing Arts Center. I'm not. But I am against a downtown performing arts center built at taxpayers expense. Unlike the NIMBYS, I want the PAC built in in my back yard as a means to make Government responsible to the needs of the entire City of Greensboro and not just the rich elites."

You see, Allen Johnson, the News & Record, downtown boosters and Greensboro's "movers and shakers" are unable to make sound, logical, long term arguments against placing the Randall Jarrell Performing Arts Center, aka, Greensboro Performing Arts Center, inside the little green circle in Northeast Greensboro. They haven't even considered neighborhoods outside of downtown. So they simply try to ignore me.

It's called the sin of omission in the news business and in your churches. It's as if they're making my point for me.

And lest we forget the News & Record is one of the parties attempting to sell downtown property to the City of Greensboro as a site on which to build their PAC.

Don't forget to use the Twitter hash tags, #GPAC2012 and #GSO to get their attention. I promise you, they are following me.

Continue to article #68. GPAC2012 ‏ @gpac2012.