MARK BAKER FIRST YOU DO - THEN YOU DON’T

First Mark Baker the head of the City Center wanted the City to be Lead Agency for the Racino expansion project. The expansion project is a force of evil for Baker and the City Center Board and now he does not want the City to be Lead Agency but wants the City Center to have that designation.  I guess Baker wants to decide who does what in Saratoga.   The big piece of information Baker has not let out of the bag is ‘how many conventions and conferences Saratoga turns away every year that the City will now be able to host with the proposed Event Center.  The City is becoming home to more and more hotels and the City Center is probably near its maximum rental capacity as Baker points out in his annual reports to the Council that convention days are increasing to the limit.

Baker is one of the highest paid City employees and the next bit of news may earn him the top spot on the list.  Have you noticed that the parking garage the City Center is proposing is slated to start construction in September?  I think that since the time between now and Labor Day is so crazy in Saratoga and many of the citizens who live here are either on vacation or have rented their houses or just can’t get downtown, it is a stretch to have all the preliminary work plus the open public comment periods during this time.  However, the information spinning out of City Hall and the Convention Center is that if Baker gets the parking garage rushed through and gets started in September he gets a nice fat bonus and a raise in salary, could that be why Mayor Yepsen wants a few more Director’s on the Board?  Maybe the current Board caves in to easily.

The new racing poles downtown look good, I wish they would get rid of the ballet butts though and get the horses out but we can’t have everything.  I was walking downtown the other day with some friends and we were crossing Broadway from the Downtowner side when we noticed the grass on the corner under the sign was high up and touching the bottom of the sign.  Hey  its tourist season, tidy up Broadway.  There also have been many complaints to DPW about the state of the Woodlawn Ave. Parking garage.  The place stinks and the residents do just about everything in there except take a bath.  Skip, it should be cleaned once a week.  Get Petunia over there to clean it when her crew is done watering the flowers.

Last time we told you about Marilyn Rivers letting the Marion Ave. garage park it’s vehicles on City property and what her reasoning is in allowing this to go on.  Well after an email to her the practice is still going on, so if an accident happens over there shouldn’t Ms. Rivers be personally liable?  Also, we spoke of the eyesore that serves as a storage facility for DPW on the same lot and it is still in bad shape.  Skip, can’t you have someone with a weed whacker like Tim get out there and trim around the building and lop down the scrub trees hugging the building?