Sorry, no balls here, my name is Sharon.

While outlawing the sale of animals on public property and private parking lots sounds noble, the truth is that shopping mall and strip center pet stores are the largest purveyors of puppy-mill dogs. Further, hobby breeders and other amateur breeders lie at the root of the problem. Until we address these parties outlawing the sale of animals in a parking lots and flea markets will be as effective as me trying to get my waste water bill lowered this year.

I too have a problem with ‘officer discretion’. As the Mayor points out, “We’ve learned that when we hear the words ‘officers’ discretion’ the result is an inequitable application of the regulation.”, police officers in San Marcos have failed in their duty to enforce the laws and ordinances in an equitable fashion. Until there are major personnel changes at the police dept. I think our pets would be safer with less discretion in the hands of law enforcement.

That being said, cycling on the access road is far better than trying to navigate Hopkins and Thorpe on a bike.

What a blessing for you that things are so civil on this board.

– That “empty field” was probably prime agricultural land. Now it is not. This simply highlights that we just don’t have anything in the same universe as land planning based on long-term values to society in this state. And that is quite intentional, because this is a “property rights” state. A truly deluded concept. But that’s another discussion. Back to the point, maybe it wasn’t in actual agricultural production, but it could have been, and in the future that may have been of some value to the community — as many believe that more localized food production will become a necessity in the future. Yet preservation of prime agricultural land appears nowhere in the “values” that guide planning and development here.

– This abatement promotes sprawl and degrades the inner city. As was noted, the 3 major tenants at Stone Creek will abandon Spring Creek to relocate there, out in BFE. What does this say about the vision San Marcos has of itself? It has no real downtown, no real sense of place except that imparted by the springs/river and the university. It is a series of ever more outlying sterile malls. It would appear that its power structure wants to keep it that way, indeed to speed it along.

– Related to this … Not that anyone walks or bikes much anyway (but in the future, they might, either by choice or necessity), and not that the Spring Creek site was at all inviting to that, but the Stone Creek location is ENTIRELY auto-centric, there’s not even the possibility of enhancing pedetrian/cycling travel at that site. Unless, of course, someone decides to locate housing around this retail wasteland. But that would consume more prime farmland and further sprawl, unless someone decides to development employment sites near there. Consuming more prime farmland? And of course, in effect relocating the real center of San Marcos to around the retail wasteland. What sort of “downtown” would that be? Something like the village in “The Prisoner”? You know, totally plastic, REALLY devoid of any sense of place.

Nope, no ability (or, apparently, desire) to plan for anything that remotely resembles “smart growth”. But still, somehow, it was important to grease that particular development. Go figure.

Finally, the major point that YS makes is that politicians have no balls — so they fall for this we gotta give them what they want or they will go elsewhere, exactly because the politicians “elsewhere” have no balls. Oh, and politicians also have no belief in or commitment to the free market. That whole concept is such an illusion. This matter is merely a graphic illustration of that. The market is ALWAYS being “mediated” by political machinations, large and small — it is not free. Again, however, this is a much larger discussion, for another time and place.

YS touches on a lot of the points of why this is a no-brainer. The other points… which I’ve made before, but since some people don’t seem to get it…

- Property tax (ad valorem) abatement. 20% to the City, 80% to Stone Creek. I wonder how much the appraised value of that property has increased, from being an EMTPY FIELD to a fully developed retail site. Probably enough to where the 20% the city gets to keep will still be an increased amount over the whole of what they’re getting now. And after 5 years, that abatement is gone.

- Never mind the fact that this was an empty field owned by the STATE, generating NO tax revenue for the better part of the last few years.

- Sales tax rebates. The City keeps the first $500K. Period. The next $500K gets split just like the property taxes - 20% to the City, 80% to Stone Creek. After that ($1 million +), it gets split 50/50.

- The TOTAL abatement will not exceed $6 million. And it’s only for five years. The argument about giving this kind of “bailout” during an economic downturn doesn’t hold water - if the center doesn’t perform as intended, guess what, the developer loses. If Stone Creek doesn’t rake in enough income over the course of 5 years, the developer loses. I would bet that the sales tax revenue currently generated by Springtown as a whole (because let’s be honest… once these three bail out, the remaining stores will likely move as their leases expire) is lower than the amount that will be generated by this development once it has an opportunity to fully develop, say year 2.

And “Can of Worms” - how is this going to result in lawsuits? If a developer can bring a similar project to the table that is going to result in a net tax increase, I’m sure they’ll be presented with a similar package.

I agree that the StoneCreek project, once under way, would have continued. What the optimist in me likes to think is that the build-out will be quicker with the overhead reduced. The reality is StoneCreek got underway during moderate economic times and things went south in a hurry. Retailers everywhere - the tenants StoneCreek was counting on - have stopped expanding or slowed to a snails pace. Those empty pad sites we see aren’t generating any sales tax revenue and precious little property tax revenue. Anything we can do as a city to make StoneCreek more attractive than say, Creekside in New Braunfels or next to Kohls in Kyle is worth considering. Yes, it was a very agressive move but I think considering the national economic condition, especially in retail, it was warranted. All we’ve given up is something we never had to begin with.

Just a wild guess but were the 4 who voted;

Susan, Chris, Pam and Kim