Barr said he’s still working on the schedule of campaign stops that will take him through the seven new counties to the 6th District — Bath, Menifee, Nicholas, Robertson, Wolfe and Fleming counties and part of Harrison County — as well as Clark, Montgomery, Powell and Estill counties. Those last four remain in the 6th District after the once-a-decade reapportionment process to make sure the populations of the districts are even.

Alessi also gets Garland on the record with his various economic views which once again demonstrates his problem — as a Tea Panderer he kinda understands what he’s supposed to say but he also kinda understands that it doesn’t all make sense, thus, Garland gets confused.

Joe sums it up:

So we won’t be able to spend money on government projects if we’re in debt. But spending money on infrastructure is good. But taxes should be lowered. But government spending itself is bad. And raising government revenues is bad. Even though debt is also bad. Because it limits government spending on infrastructure.

If you can decipher Garland’s positions, then you can also decipher this… (it’s Not Safe For Work, folks, so David Williams: close the door.)

Also… the CJ has new details on the revised bill:

The revised bill, however, retains another controversial provision to protect the horse industry. It says no casinos would be allowed within 60 miles of one of the state’s eight tracks, which would mean there’d be no Louisville casino unless Churchill Downs Inc. got a license.

It also would close the Northern Kentucky market to any casino unless it were at Turfway Park.

The areas left open by the 60-mile radius rule effectively limits non-track casino sites to the London-Corbin area, near Ashland and possibly near Fort Campbell in Western Kentucky.

EdR vice president Tom Trubiana said his company is accepting low returns on the first dorm “because we wanted to be part of UK for the long term.”

“The uniqueness here is potentially that we could be the sole-source housing for UK for the future,” Trubiana said. “That’s why it absolutely needs to be a home run.”

Cool. A home run! This deal isn’t a single or a bases clearing double or even a ground rule double. It’s a home run!

Or it needs to be one. Continuing…

If UK and EdR agreed to build a theoretical $10 million dorm, a financial model presented on Tuesday shows that UK would get $239,000 in revenue during the first year of the deal, and EdR would bring in about $239,000. However, the model shows that EdR would not start to make a profit until year 11 of the deal. By year 50, UK would make almost $2 million a year, and EdR would make $1.1 million, an 11 percent profit.

UK and EdR are deciding whether they will pursue an exemption from property taxes on the new dorm. Those taxes are built into EdR’s rates of return, Trubiana said.

“Any benefit would go to UK students in the form of lower rents,” he said.

1) Why would you lower rents when you could make more money? That’s bad business sense.

2) What are the guarantees behind that statement? Is it in the contract?

3) Why does EdR feel no responsibility to the community it seeks to profit off of?

4) Why does the University feel no responsibility to contribute to the upkeep and safety and well being of the city in which it exists?

As Blackford reported the other day:

Property taxes are divided by school systems, city governments and state government, with the majority going to public schools.

Fayette County taxes about 1 percent of a property’s assessed value. Approximately 68 percent of that goes to Fayette County Schools, 13 percent goes to the state, 9 percent goes to the city, 3 percent goes to the public health department, and 7 percent goes to LexTran. Less than 1 percent goes to UK extension services and soil- and water-conservation programs.

Poor big businesses and their big tax burden. If corporations are in fact individuals, then should they really be granted tax relief individuals would never get?

In what world could you stop paying your property taxes?

Wouldn’t that be nice? Don’t you give enough back to the community as it is, just by being you?

Here’s another idea: Stop charging homeowners who live in the neighborhoods bordering the UK campus property tax.

If they don’t have to pay their property taxes, these homeowners could invest the money in a scholarship fund or something to reduce student costs and make college cheaper for the kids.

Because they would. They really would.

****

Read more Blackford.

Read UK’s Press Release.

Read Education Realty Trust’s Press Release.

Buy your EDR stock now!

And read the ground lease draft (PDF). Some highlights:

(b) Commercial Tenants shall occupy the Premises pursuant to a written lease, license or sublease (each, a “Permitted Commercial Lease” and together with the Permitted Residential Leases, the “Permitted Leases”). The terms of all Permitted Commercial Leases shall comply with the Requirements, and all Permitted Commercial Leases shall be on forms approved by Landlord, in its reasonable discretion; provided that Permitted Commercial Leases (i) shall provide that in the event that such Permitted Commercial Lease is assigned to Landlord or this Lease is terminated, Landlord shall have the right to terminate such Permitted Commercial Lease if necessary to ensure that the Premises are exempt from property taxes when owned by Landlord and in compliance with applicable law relating to tax exempt financing and (ii) may provide that such right is subject to payment by Landlord of a reasonable early termination fee.

and…

Section 8.01 Taxes. Tenant shall pay and discharge punctually when due all taxes, any payments in lieu of taxes, assessments, water and sewer rents, rates and charges, vault license fees or rentals, levies, license and permit fees and all other governmental impositions and charges of every kind and nature whatsoever, extraordinary as well as ordinary, foreseen and unforeseen, which shall be charged, levied, laid, assessed, imposed upon, become due and payable out of or in respect of, or become liens upon the whole or any part of the Premises, together with all interest and penalties, under all present or future laws, ordinances, requirements, orders, directives, rules or regulations or the federal, state, county, and city governments and of all other governmental authorities whatsoever as well as and including all payments in lieu of any of the foregoing (the “Taxes”). With the prior written consent of Landlord, in the Landlord’s sole and absolute discretion, Tenant may, at its sole cost and expense, seek a tax abatement or other tax exemption for the Premises. At the option of Landlord, the savings obtained as a result of any tax abatement will either serve to reduce the rent charged to the Residential Residents of the Premises or increase the Rent to the University.

also…

Section 8.05 Right to Refund of Taxes. Any savings, credits, refunds or rebates obtained as a result of any tax abatement or other tax exemption being obtained for the Premises shall belong to Landlord and be allocated in accordance with Section 8.01. Any refunds or rebates of the Taxes paid by Tenant shall belong to Tenant and be used in Tenant’s sole discretion.

Section 8.06 Separate Parcel. If necessary or advisable, Landlord shall cooperate with Tenant’s efforts to cause the Premises to be subdivided or re-subdivided to establish the Land and the Improvements as a separate tax parcels.

And some financials…

The Senate State and Local Government Committee will meet at noon today — with special guest Steve Beshear!

The Governor’s gonna testify on behalf of the gambling bill, and then the Committee will likely vote on it. Also testifying, Jamie Comer, the Ag Commish, Republican and supporter of the bill as it benefits the horse industry.

Yesterday some religious types descended on the Capitol to pray for the timely death of the bill:

The Rev. Adam Greenway of Louisville, president of the Kentucky Baptist Convention, said church members would remember at the ballot boxes how lawmakers voted on Beshear’s bill.

“We are speaking in one voice to say no to expanded gambling,” Greenway said.

The Rev. Paul Chitwood, KBC executive director, said the bill “mocks the poor,” and he urged lawmakers to vote their hearts.

“How many children are we willing to lay upon the altar of casino gambling?” Chitwood asked.

That’s a really good question. What is the over/under on the number of sacrificial kids?

And, since I can’t find any more embeddable videos of Vegas Vacation and Saved by the Bell’s Vegas episode doesn’t appear to be on YouTube either and I’m tired of searching for stuff, I’ll just leave you with this for no particular reason:

From the NYT:

As Roman Catholic leaders and government officials clash over the proper role of religion and reproductive health, shifts in health care economics are magnifying the tension. Financially stronger Catholic-sponsored medical centers are increasingly joining with smaller secular hospitals, in some cases limiting access to treatments like contraception, abortion and sterilization.

In Seattle, Swedish Health Services has offered elective abortions for decades. But the hospital agreed to stop when it joined forces this month with Providence Health & Services, one of the nation’s largest Catholic systems.

In late December, Gov. Steve Beshear of Kentucky turned down a bid by Catholic Health Initiatives, another large system, to merge with a public hospital in Louisville, in part because of concern that some women would have less access to contraceptive services.

And in Rockford, Ill., there is resistance to a plan by OSF HealthCare, run by the Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis, to buy a hospital because of new restrictions that would require women to go elsewhere if they wanted a tubal ligation after a Caesarean section.

The article goes on to look at wider trends, and gives the Kentucky deal a bit of a closer look. It highlights well the increasing power of Catholic health systems and, in a national economy where health care represents a rather obvious economic bubble, how they are gobbling up small institutions.

It’s important to point out that these “religious” corporations aren’t like old-timey hospitals with sweet nuns taking care of patients out of charity. Times change. Today, five of the top ten hospital systems are Catholic, including the top three revenue earners in the country.

Good times!

Or are those good works?

Meanwhile, the UofL hospital is seeking new partners! The C-J reports:

University Hospital’s search for potential partners is attracting interest from the new health-care company it unsuccessfully sought to join last year — a company that limits reproductive care because of Catholic health directives.

And that’s upsetting critics who say Gov. Steve Beshear has already rejected a proposed merger involving those hospital systems because it didn’t serve the public’s best interests.

Read on!

Witness this outstanding performance:

Sweet nothings!

The people of Michigan are a pretty smart group (which isn’t that surprising since Kentucky’s sent a lot of good folks up I-75 over the years), so hopefully we can trust the Pleasant Peninsula to look about them and find… anyone else. They should respect themselves and their state more than this.

The NYT article talks of the incremental building up of Madison, WI and its university gateway:

Pieces of the seven-block stretch from Regent Street to Lake Mendota were installed episodically over the decades, including the Memorial student union (built in 1928) along the lakeshore that has long been one of this capital city’s favorite warm-weather gathering spots; a public square one block off the lake; and a collection of campus buildings dating to the 1950s and ’60s.

In the last decade, university architects and administrators, working with Madison’s planners, have been more purposeful. Prompted by trends in urban design that emphasize closer ties between retail stores and cultural institutions, open space, recreation and stronger neighborhoods, the university and the city developed a more definitive construction plan. When it is finished, the 2.45 million-square-foot project is expected to have cost nearly $500 million.

The Herald editorial:

Yes, yes, UK must stay fixated on getting and policing just the right contract terms if it boldly goes where no university has gone before by outsourcing all its student housing to a for-profit company.

But let’s not lose sight of the overarching purpose for launching this ambitious plan to swiftly improve and increase on-campus student housing: Advancing scholarship by enhancing the quality of students’ experience in Lexington.

Where that kind of big-picture thinking could lead is illustrated by what the University of Wisconsin and the city of Madison have accomplished.

So long as we’re thinking big… what would happen if the University of Kentucky could somehow pull together the resources to bring the brightest minds they can find to a central location — let’s call it “a campus” — where really smart people old and young who study economics and business and architecture and engineering and urban design and all sorts of other pursuits can be put to work coming up with truly transformative ideas for how to remake the UK campus and pay for it.

And what if… just what if… half of those attendees actually paid to take part and the other half got paid too little to be there?

What would that meeting of the minds look like?

Or is the message from the University of Kentucky that the school is incapable of attracting such talent?

February 14th, The Hill:

McConnell staying at arm’s length

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) publicly distanced himself from House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Tuesday, the latest twist in a relationship put to the test in recent weeks.

McConnell declined to endorse a proposal announced by Boehner on Monday to extend the payroll tax holiday without paying for it.

They even got this bit of color into the AP:

“With their flashing lights, free-flowing alcoholic drinks, all-night hours and generally intoxicating atmosphere, casinos are more likely than other gambling options to lead to bad decisions and catastrophic losses for patrons, particularly those prone to problem or compulsive gambling,” Delahanty wrote in the two-page letter, distributed a day before the issue is to be considered by a Senate committee.

It does sound fun until you get to the catastrophic losses and the compulsive behavior. That sounds less fun.

More fun? Here’s what the New York Catholic Conference wrote last November in urging their followers to oppose New York’s effort to amend the state constitution with a gambling provision:

With their flashing lights, free-flowing alcoholic drinks, all-night hours and generally intoxicating atmosphere, casinos are more likely than other gambling options to lead to bad decisions and catastrophic losses for patrons, particularly those prone to problem or compulsive gambling.

But they are allowed to sing the same tune because they’re just sticking to the Catechism:

The Catholic Church teaches that gambling is a morally neutral act and that games of chance “are not in themselves contrary to justice” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2413). However, the Catechism also warns that “the passion for gambling risks becoming an enslavement” and becomes morally unacceptable when it deprives an individual of what is necessary to provide for his/her needs and those of others.

It’s probably a bad time to point out there are casinos in Ireland and in Italy, not to mention already expanded gaming in New York and Massachusetts.