I had a chance last night to listen to part of the Indianapolis City-County council debate on the plan to lease (for free) the newly remodeled Georgia Street to Indianapolis Downtown, Inc. (IDI) an organization that lives on city government handouts, spends lavishly on itself and does little work on promoting Indianapolis that is not or cannot be handled by other organizations.Once again, it appears that we have a city asset taxpayers have spent millions on, only only to find our city leaders want to give it away to a private entity for free. IDI will manage the place, but apparently will also keep all the profits associated with the venue.
What amazed me was that my fellow Republicans, with the notable exception of Christine Scales, was all for simply handing over the property to IDI, without even bothering following normal statutory procedure, i.e. doing an appraisal and taking bids on running the venue.
Meanwhile Democrats like Brian Mahern, Dane Mahern, Angela Mansfield and even Monroe Gray played the role of fiscally responsible legislative officials asking whether the council should be following proper procedure and making sure the deal was in the best interests of the taxpayers.
When did my Republican Party representatives abandon the role of being responsible stewards of the taxpayer money? Viewers who didn't know the individuals involved would have thought the Democratic councilors were the Republicans and the Republicans were the Democrats. The GOP majority shows why they deserve to be in the minority come January 1st.
Libertarian Councilor Ed Coleman also voted for taxpayers and against the giveaway.