“Well, there are 300 or so people over the age of 65, there are 200 over the age of 75, and there are 100 over the age of 85 in this town. So, there are at least 600 people over the age of 65 here!!! How on earth can you possibly not come to the conclusion that this town needs more subsidized senior housing?”
God damn. This is a rant concerning a meeting that took place this last Friday, and I’m still in shock. I just can’t reconcile how this pork-barrel boondoggle has gotten this far.
Why do these people even bother to hire us to do a market study when they’ve already come to their own conclusion? Surely the word has gotten out by now, we are NOT the people you want if you need someone to rubber stamp your doomed project. There are any number of firms out there that will make up whatever number you want for a price, but it ain’t us. Which is why the respective state and federal agencies trust us so much, because if we say it’s a go, then it’s a go.
FOR FUCK’S SAKE, YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT SPENDING $200,000 PER GOD DAMN UNIT, OF GOD DAMN TAX-PAYER MONEY!!! DO YOU HAVE ANY FUCKING CLUE WHAT KIND OF HOME THAT WOULD BUILD IN THIS PART OF THE WORLD???
You could build each and every one of these seniors a mansion and GIVE IT TO THEM for this kind of money. But instead, you want to turn a nearly 100-year old death trap of a hotel into an INDEPENDENT LIVING facility in a tiny town where I can’t even guaranty it will ever fill up, and certainly not within the year it typically takes. In return, YOU WILL BE CHARGING THESE FOLKS RENT!!! AND YOU THINK THERE ARE HUNDREDS OF SENIORS JUST WAITING TO SELL THEIR HOMES TO DO THIS!!! If I were only slightly less self-restrained, I would bash your skulls in and feast on your brains, so that they could never ever again be employed in such ways.
As near as I can tell, every single person involved in this proposal is either grossly ignorant or sticking their fingers in their ears. And now, because of your inconceivable ignorance, I have to be the bad guy to kill this white elephant. Because you people have the mental faculties of emu-droppings, I’ve got to tell the people of this lovely town that this project just isn’t feasible after you all have gotten their hopes up that the hotel that was once the town’s pride and joy would be rehabilitated to her former glory. All because you’re so god damned ignorant you can’t even handle simple arithmetic.
if that’s a correct quote, they’re also incapable of simple arithmetic. if " there are 300 or so folks over the age of 65" at the beginning of the sentence, how do they end up with “over 600 people over the age of 65 here” at the end? (yes, I know they added again the folks over75 and 85, but sheesh…)
DDG: Nope, nor do I intend to divulge the specifics of where this is or who is involved. I will tell you it’s pretty far from Norman, and it’s a rehab deal, rather than new construction. However, should this thing ever get farther than where it is now (which it won’t as long as I draw breath!) I fully intend to do some whistle-blowing at every level I can think of.
Meh, I’ve paraphrased and substituted due to my poor memory and the fact that I’ve been drinking heavily since this meeting. That said, I think they were implying that there were age groups like “over 95” that should have been further added… before they were done, I’m sure this town of about 3,500 would have had 6,000 seniors living in it.
What drives me nuts is the fact that I know at least a few of them realize this clusterfuck just isn’t possible. I know this, because they’re already conspiring to transplant homeless people living in shelters to this project in case it isn’t at stabilized occupancy when the folks from HUD and OHFA drop in for their annual inspections.
These god damn fuck-nuggets know they’re scamming the federal government, and they want me to sign my name to it.
Part of me is insulted, the other 95% is filled with murderous rage. I think I’m mostly pissed off because I work my ass off for these folks. There are untold thousands out there, especially low-income seniors, that could really use a decent, affordable place to live. Hell, I’m practically socialistic in leanings when it comes to housing. And these wastes of water and carbon want to piss away six million dollars for thirty units in a town that probably doesn’t even need them. All because they think their hideous death trap of a hotel is pretty. If this cock-blastery makes it to the formal application stage, there’re going to be some revealing letters written to every state and federal agency involved, with my name signed at the bottom. I don’t care if it means no one hires our firm ever again for anything, I don’t care if it means I’ll never work in this business ever again. As far as I’m concerned, these people are stealing from elderly people with Social Security their only source of income. The fact that their so god damned stupid only makes me want to wipe them from the gene pool even more.
Yes, I completely understand. It was the reason I started this rant in the first place. As I said, before these fuck-nuggets were done, there would be millions of seniors in a town of 3,600.
Aside from this absurdity, how is Norman these days? I lived there from 1992-1996. I was in elementary school at the time, and I haven’t been there since then.
ME: I’m actually in Tulsa now, I suppose I ought to update my location thingy. Norman’s doing just fine, it’s continuing its steady evolution from a college town to just another suburb of OKC. Under Boren, OU is rapidly becoming one of the premier schools in the Big 12, if not the entire region. About a year ago or so they opened a new museum of natural history south of the campus, and they’re currently adding new seats to Memorial Stadium and doubling the size of the Fred Jones Museum of Art to house a multi-million dollar art donation made a little while back. The university has also gotten a lot pickier about the selection process, which they can get away with since they’re beating applicants away with sticks.
Aslan2: It’s because they’re trying to rehabilitate a structure that should have been scraped decades ago, under the aupsices of “historic preservation.” If they razed the building and built a brand-new one just like it, it would cost half that, but they insist on preserving the concrete frame and facade, as well as any interior finish that is salvageable. I’m all for affordable housing, but this is simply a ridiculous waste that ought to be funded with private money. I cringe at the thought of how many truly needy seniors there are out there that could really use this money, and would be just as happy in a facility costing less than half as much.
