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5thEstate.com is the best |
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5thEstate.com is the best |
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If you never been interviewed by the media, you can't know what it's like to have a lengthy conversation with a reporter about a broad range of topics when you know that only a few items will be quoted in the article. Such was the case with the article entitled, "14 seek convention center board seat". Please note that the Intell put this important article on page four with ZERO pictures! While the reporter treated me very fairly (for once!), I decided to publish my answers to the questions he posed but didn't print. This is exactly how I would use 5thEstate.com if I was appointed.
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Why "Kill" or "Curtail"?
Questions Asked but Never Printed If you never been interviewed by the media, you can't know what it's like to have a lengthy conversation with a reporter about a broad range of topics when you know that only a few items will be quoted in the article. Such was the case with the article entitled, "14 seek convention center board seat". Please note that the Intell put this important article on page four with ZERO pictures! While the reporter treated me very fairly (for once!), I decided to publish my answers to the questions he posed but didn't print. This is exactly how I would use 5thEstate.com if I was appointed. Why should I rely on the newspaper - who stands to gain a 1/4 of billion dollar taxpayer funded project for pennies - to accurately print my thoughts? The spelling and grammar mistakes are my own but you know what I am saying! I am embellishing on these answers, but they are essentially what I gave to the reporter when asked off the cuff. Would you buy a $100,000 Mercedes Benz if you knew it was going to force you to get two part-time jobs and be strapped for years to come? Would you break that deal - even if it might cost you the $1,000 deposit? That's what exactly the kind of deal that is facing the taxpayers with the 1/4 of a billion dollar convention center project on Penn Square. If we stop the deal now - it will cost millions. If we built it under the current deal it will cost generations of taxpayers millions and millions of dollars every single year - and that's if it goes as planned! If it doesn't go as planned, taxpayers could face a property tax increase or raise the price-sensitive bed-tax which will cause the tourism business to drop! The reporter didn't ask me WHY I wanted to kill or curtail the project so let me say why now: The project is bad of Lancaster City and Lancaster County. While it may "waste" money to stop it now, in the long run it will save a much costlier mistake of being made! Once the center is built and they can't pay the debt on the 1/4 of a billion dollar debt (cost over runs will bring it to that!) future generations of Lancaster Countians will pay the price for these foolish decisions. Do you understand that the authority is pouring foundations when they don't have the financing for the project?!?! Rather than print the damaging fact that the change in leadership will hurt the selling of the bonds, the Lancaster New Era printed that the foundations were being poured! They left out the FACT that the authority is doing this without the money to pay for the building!! Who builds without having the mortgage in place?!? I will tell you right now, the print news monopoly doesn't want my answers to be read, published or heard! Both the Intell and the New Era, refused to print my plan on HOW I am going to kill the project NOW because they are hoping to silence it! Because of this dynamic, I have taken the next logical step and printed what I want on my website so that you the reader can know what I am thinking without filter by the press. Tell your friends! Tell your enemies! Word has to get out because the media (including WGAL) is so sucked up into this project that no other voice is heard on their channel! Here are few of the questions and my answers for the 1/2 hour conversation I had with the reporter: "What would you do if you became an authority board member?" I would immediately invite the current county board members (which number 3) to the Lyndon Diner for pie and coffee to discuss how to either "kill" or "curtail" this project. (I wouldn't be a board member so there would be no violation of the Sunshine Act but frankly I wouldn't care who came along!)
(The newspaper doesn't want to print the above because they KNOW that the bond deal would NEVER go through!) "In your application, you say that you don't work for any Lancaster politician but wouldn't it be a conflict to be on the board?" Here's what that means: No one owns me! Unlike the print-news-monopoly, I have no profit motive for doing what I do. I am doing what I think is best for Lancaster County. Just because I have 5thEstate.com, which is a hobby site, doesn't mean that I should give up my right to do what I think is best and try and influence things. "Wouldn't sitting on the board be a conflict for 5thEstate.com? How would you handled a situation, for instance, about another board member?" First off, I don't write about every issue in Lancaster County. I write what the newspaper REFUSES to write or what the newspaper DISTORTS. That being said, to the contrary, if I am appointed to the board, I will use that position to let the public know what is going on! I will publish all the information that I can get my hands on so the people paying the freight will see what's up. Unlike the newspaper, which has used their position at the table to benefit themselves financially, I will use the position at the table to help the public. "Some people say that you are too controversial. They say that you are not tolerate of other people's opinions. What do you say about that?" I currently have great relationship with the convention center authority board members who are cheerleaders of the project. (I actually have never had an extensive conversation with the county appointees but have with the city appointees). That being said, the problem with this project is that we have way too much "getting along" these almost 8 years! All of that "getting along" is costing the taxpayer's millions and millions of dollars. And to the point: I do not take any of this personal. People can disagree without being disagreeable. This project has been marked by project cheerleaders 'dissing the public and ignoring our questions and concerns. That has to change. As a board member, I am not going to allow members of the public to be treated the way they have these many years. I will publicly say, "That's not right" and demand a change! Pay a little now or a pay a lot later! It's like having a deal to buy a brand new Mercedes Benz that will cost $100,000. Losing a $1,000 deposit is better than getting saddled with a car that will strap you for the next six years with debt and car upkeep! Breaking the deal would hurt but not as much as keeping the car which will alter your lifestyle tremendously! Let's break this deal before we get the county strapped with debt that will hurt taxpayers and the tourist industry for decades to come!
Ron Harper Jr
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