- My Mart is going to be bigger than yours.
In the three party arms race over which city will be the first to build a permanent medical mart facility, Cleveland has — on paper at least — an apparent upper hand. The project is scheduled to break ground a full year before competitors New York and Nashville, and thanks to the slick sales-work of soon-ousted County Commissioners and MMPI head Chris Kennedy, the taxpayers are fronting the ticket price.
But the real frosting on Cleveland’s cake is that MMPI brass claim they’ve already locked in business, brandishing 32 signed letters of intent from companies willing to set up shop in the mart and an additional 16 pledges from conferences and trade shows.
At first look, it’s a credible swat to project naysayers who believe the business plan has no legs — credible, that is, until you find out MMPI refuses to announce what companies sent letters. Johnson & Johnson is one thing; Joe’s Band-Aids, quite another. Kennedy, however, isn’t naming names.
