The financing of the project remains a complicated jumble of eyebrow-raising “creative” maneuvers (about which readers should consult Plain Dealer reporter Michelle Jarboe’s work for details).
We’ll look into those details as well. There are a series of meetings beginning next Saturday where residents of the school district can learn about the financing proposal and provide feedback in the lead-up to a School Board work session on August 8. (The Jackson administration, tellingly, wouldn’t discuss the plan with the PD.)
But for our immediate purposes:
Bob Stark’s first comment yesterday (~40:45) concerned the project’s punny name: nuCLEus. Stark wanted to underscore the fact that the name was supposed to connote: “New Cleveland Us.”
What?
“That’s not just a coincidence,” Stark said. “It operates that way in terms of its position relative to everything else around it. But it also metaphorically represents what this project, we hope, will be for the 21st Century in Cleveland.”
Go on…
“Our goal is no less than to have the catalytic effect that the Tower City project had on Cleveland at the beginning of the 20th Century.”
Stark said that he’d noted that at the turn of every century cultures, attitudes and economies tend to shift too — nuCLEus is intended to be a “catalytic event” that reflects current shifts. It will be a “connector of all existing assets” and an “iconic statement that carries Cleveland into the future.”
For Stark, the future is a global economy, and nuCLEus will carry Cleveland there. The only way to compete in the global economy, he hinted, was to create an urban lifestyle or urban atmosphere that would attract top talent to Cleveland (I think.)
“You can do global economic work from anywhere in the world,” Stark said, “and the choice is where you want to live, and where the community has what represents the culture of the new generation. That’s what nuCLEus is about as a mixed-used development and an iconically stated architectural wonder.”
But residents should pay closer attention to the financing than to the urban lifestyle rhetoric — when it comes to downtown development, every project is pegged as The Answer (and tend to be enthusiastically supported by Frank Jackson, recent campaign-trail comments notwithstanding.)
But as Jarboe has reported: “nuCLEus could be Cleveland’s first real estate project in a decade to reallocate tax revenues otherwise earmarked for public schools.”
This article appears in Jul 12-18, 2017.
What’s with the snarky attitude, Sam? I felt like I was reading a sulking teenager’s diary instead of an “article…” (I think).
Take your negativity to another city and find yourself another career.
Stark is 20 years too late with his “global Cleveland” concept. Globalization is SO 20th Century — has Stark even heard of Brexit? Stark is clueless… except when it comes to stealing $$$ from the poorest schoolchildren in the country — that is his area of expertise.
It’s a piece or a story, CTH…you’re the one who sounds like that sulking teen when you label it an “article”…grow the f’k up, loser.
Bunch of hype and hot air “New CLE Us”…Cheezus Chrysler…about an extremely UGLY concept…it looks like that high-rise hellhole in which 80 poor bastards died in London. BEFORE it burned down, I mean. Nice plan to ruin the skyline, boys. Please stop this mess before it kills more vistas.
Chuckles the Clown
If it means dipping into taxes earmarked for education, so be it. At last something tangible will be generated from our money. The only thing those magicians on the school board know how to do is make it disappear.
This thing is ugly and completely out of place. Sticks out of the ground like a tumor.
When is Cleveland going to have standards when it comes to development, architecture, design, and urban planning? This city will do anything just to get developers to like them.
Much like people who have the same approach in their personal relationships, in the end you get screwed, never move forward, and never achieve the desired vision of yourself.
Get some standards and don’t compromise, Cleveland!!!
Yeah, we really need all these multi-story, out-of-scale monstrosities dwarfing everything nearby with their oversized ugliness. At the Q, in Playhouse Square, and in Bingetown, next to that new brewery-and-pizza joint.
Low-rise areas don’t need these greedheads, who are cramming too many overpriced units (and vehicles) into too small a space, When they are finished ,and jut into the sky, these edifice complexes appear to be giving the finger to everything and everyone else around them.
Which is exactly what these idiot developers are doing..
Chuckles the Clown
A lot of cry babies on this page! Taller the better make Cleveland’s skyline great. Just FYI he is not ripping the school system off. They get more money if the building gets built and the deal get approved then if nothing gets built at all. Amazing how dumb some people are!
This lot generates a little over 350k a year in taxes now…multiply by 30 years you have 10.5 million. Stark will give 18 mil upfront, then the state will also pitch in to a tune of 56 mil all said and done. Do the math. This doesn’t mention the money generated from the businesses and tenants in the project. They are not “taking money” from the schools and it will not cost the tax payers a dime. CMSD does not have a money issue for students, it has a parenting issue…money doesn’t solve that. Oh, by the way, here is the “telling” information that the reporter couldn’t seem to find. http://www.clevelandmetroschools.org/nucleus
I’m hoping someone will do some looking into what Stark’s angle is on this – why build something that is going to cost more than it’s valued? The deal for the schools (according to the Mayor’s office, etc.) sounds almost too good to be true, so I can’t help looking for the catch. Knowing Cleveland, there’s got to be one.