FREE
- TAKE ONE – START 2006 RIGHT!
Get
Privately ‘Fit’ In ’06
Bowling
Green, a village turned city built around a public university, sometimes
forgets that it was private industry and private businesses that made this
country great. Not the government.
And we sometimes
forget that public education is an arm the government that should be every
bit as accountable as local, city, county, state and federal government
operations are supposed to be.
Bowling Green State University is such an icon, such a
source of notoriety and wealth for the community, that it receives exalted
status in the minds of many. It is untouchable. Beyond criticism. Take BGSU to
task and you can hear the hissing all over town.
If BGSU wants to start a business or operation that
competes with private business, it does so with little or no opposition.
The Recreation
Center of three decades ago dried up the market for physical fitness facilities
for many years. The university’s food service keeps the number of
restaurants down in the city, though we have 70 or so. Yet most of us accept
the fact that the 20,000 students need recreation and food services on the
scene.
So we tolerate government competing with private
businesses on campus.
Off campus is another story.
Maybe the Bowling Green City Government is a secret BGSU
wannabe, desiring to expand its tentacles throughout the city regardless of how
it might impact private businesses.
Why else would the BGBT (Beware Government Brain Trust)
decide to pump $4 million into a Community Center without a viable marketing
plan and without a vote of the people?
As the Community
Center begins to drain cash, the beleaguered City Parks and Recreation Dept.
has been handed the impossible mess and asked to turn around the losses.
Big Public Ad Dollars Go To Private Newspaper
So the city is now spending thousands of public dollars
advertising in the privately owned Sentinel-Tribune
to promote the white elephant by luring away customers from the other fitness
centers in town. Full page ad here. Half page ad there. Free publicity in the
news columns and on page one (as an unstated reward to a big public advertiser).
None of the privately owned fitness centers in Bowling
Green can afford this level of advertising and promotion, yet I understand they
are holding their own during the onslaught.
If the private
fitness businesses go under – done in by the government – Bowling Green will be
the poorer as business and employment taxes will not longer be collected.
My hero in all this is Tom St. Julian, whose fitness
center on North Main Street bears his name. He has had the courage to speak out
again the city’s incursion into private enterprise way back when the Beware
Government City Council was discussing it. He continues to speak out now. Being
the competitor that he is, St. Julian has dug into his own pocket to invest in
new equipment TO COMPETE WITH A GOVERNMENT ENTERPRISE.
January is a big month for fitness memberships because
folks wake up Jan. 2 overweight and vow to do something about it. My advice: save gas money and strike a
blow for private enterprise by joining St. Julian’s Fitness, Inc., this month.
-- John
K. Hartman, publisher, 4 Corners News
& Views, John.Hartman@dacor.net
Page
2 4 Corners News & Views Jan. 1, 2006
Randy Gardner: Always A Bridesmaid
Poor Randy Gardner. Always a bridesmaid.
Bowling Green’s state senator keeps getting passed over
to be majority leader of the Ohio Senate. He was the No. 2, the No. 3, the No.
4-ranked leader in the chamber, but never able to move up.
It seems unfair to a guy who had such a good jump shot at
Eastwood High School, whose dad was county school superintendent, who learned
politics at the feet of former Ohio House Speaker Charles Kurfess, and who
engineered a “switch,” an old high school basketball term, with fellow
Republican Bob Latta to stay in the Legislature.
That’s right. Gardner and Latta circumvented the will of
the Ohio voters to limit folks to eight consecutive years in the Legislature by
switching jobs six years ago. Gardner went from the House to the Senate and
Latta vice versa.
(Note to calendar watchers and political junkies: Gardner
and Latta will hit the term limit barrier again in 2008. Can you once more say
“switch?” You would think that the Wood County Democratic Party would take
Gardner and Latta to task for this chicanery and come up with candidates to
toss them out of office. But we Democrats haven’t elected a non-incumbent to
county or legislative office in two decades. We didn’t make a stink the first
time they switched in 2000. When they say “switch,” we duck.)
The Sentinel-Tribune
recently did a stroke-ola piece on Gardner to celebrate his 20th
anniversary in the Legislature. It blamed Gardner’s failure to ascend to the
top rung on his devotion to his family. I have no quarrel with depicting
Gardner as a devoted husband and father. I respect him in that area of life.
In my opinion the
real reason for Gardner’s failure to be top dog in the Senate is because he is
not right-wing enough to satisfy the Neanderthal elements that run the
Republican Party in Ohio.
To his credit, Gardner is too friendly with public K-12 education
and public higher education to satisfy the conservative crazies. Representing a
town built around a public university, Gardner would be a fool to thumb his
nose at public education. Charles Kurfess, once a state representative and
minority leader of the Ohio House, also was not conservative enough to satisfy
the hard right and paid when they defeated him in the primary for governor way
back when.
Gardner’s athletic proclivities may still get him into trouble.
He was part of a golf foursome in Toledo -- including Coingate architect, now
indicted BG native Tom Noe -- that is being scrutinized by authorities. Whether
or not Gardner received more than a $75 gift in greens fees and whether or not
that should have been reported to the Ohio Ethics Commission remains to be
seen.
Would You Like To Buy An Empty Theater For $500,000?
Downtown Bowling
Green’s latest eyesore is the empty Cla-Zel Theatre.
Apparently to keep a religious group from purchasing it
and turning it into a church ministering to college students, some local
investors bought the venerable theater for $240,000 a few years back and
reportedly put that amount again into fixing it up.
The investors had
no way of knowing that college students and young adults would soon prefer
buying DVDs and watching them in the privacy of their residences than going to
the movies.
My suggestion: turn the Cla-Zel into a six theater
complex and maybe the kids will turn out for a choice of movies. Otherwise,
knock it down along with some adjacent unused or underused buildings for, gag,
I can hardly mutter the words, PARKING. Gag. FOR THE LIBRARY.
4 Corners News & Views You Read It Here First Tip Of The Month: No BG school bond issues in 2006.
Reminder from 4 Corners: The deadline for filing candidate
petitions is 4 p.m. Feb. 16.
4 Corners News & Views of Bowling Green was founded June 1, 2005 by John K.
Hartman, its publisher. Its purpose is to provide additional news and
points-of-view to citizens of Bowling Green in the belief that thorough
awareness of and discussion of issues makes for a better community. It will be
available free at various drop-off points in Bowling Green and by email by
sending your email address and request to John.Hartman@dacor.net. Patrons may
support 4 Corners News & Views
for $10 per issue. Ads may be purchased for $20 per issue. Comments and submissions are welcome. Contact information: John.Hartman@dacor.net
; 419-352-8180; 1400 Wren Road, BG, OH 43402. Back issues at www.wcnet.org/~randers/liberalbg/
. Copyright
2005, John K. Hartman, All Rights Reserved.