Let's do the sprawl so we can get a TV station

Oh, joy! Oh, joy! We could get more radio stations and maybe even a TV station in Rolla if we'll support the city government in its plans to sprawl Rolla to the west.

Here's the scoop from the Rolla Daily News, posted online Thursday:

Rolla Area Chamber of Commerce members on Wednesday were updated on three development projects that could shape Rolla for generations — the Missouri Route 72 extension, the Rolla West Fifth Interchange and Missouri S&T’s Tech Park.
Elizabeth Bax, executive director of the Rolla Regional Economic Commission (RREC), Steve Hargis, Rolla city engineer, and John Petersen, Rolla city Development Coordinator, each spoke to about 60 members of the Chamber who gathered at Zeno’s Motel & Steak House at 7 a.m. for the Quarterly Breakfast.
With the aid of a PowerPoint presentation, the trio explained the importance of each project to Rolla’s stance in regional economics and growth.
“Rolla West is the key to Rolla’s prosperity,” Bax said, as she began her program. “It is very important if Rolla is to have a regional voice that we continue with this project.”
Bax said the RREC is poised to assist in the growth and attraction of business to Rolla and Phelps County.
“If we grow our population, we will grow our media outlets — more TV and radio stations, and I think we’ll see more government funding,” Bax said ....
Hargis next spoke about the logistics of the developments.
“Rolla West is about 1,000 acres and the Tech Park is about 60 acres,” he said standing in front of a PowerPoint map of the areas. The E-Cubed area on the north side of Interstate 44 is a project the Missouri S&T is promoting in joint projects with the Missouri Highway Patrol that includes the wind turbine and a hydrogen refueling station. E-Cubed represents Education, Energy and Environment, credos for the development located just north of Interstate 44.
“We’d like to see this grow and make Rolla stronger,” Hargis said. “Ninety percent of all the money for our Street Department comes from sales taxes. We grow those numbers and we’ll be able to do more for our streets.”
While Bax provided a vision and Hargis discussed the logistics of getting the I’s dotted and the T’s crossed, it was Petersen who provided Chamber members a map of what Rolla West may be....
"We can see a hospitality district, a big-box store or more, a general retail and even an entertainment district. There are 1.65 square miles here,” Petersen said.
And while plans are grand, it may not happen immediately.
“We don’t expect to see all this happen for 20 to 30 years, but we’re getting there. Ridgeview Drive is one-sixth of the way there. It has to happen first. It’s not like this is the chicken-and-the-egg thing.”

Here's some more good news: We might be able to get federal tax money "earmarked" for the project. The RDN reported:

During a Rolla Optimists meeting later Wednesday, U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (R-Cape Girardeau), who is touring her district during a Congressional recess, said she would be in favor of federally earmarked money for Rolla West.
“This could be federal money,” Emerson told a group of 22 Optimists in the Gasconade Room of the Havener Center.

Rolla puts its tax money to good use

Here in Rolla, the majority of us love national chain stores, and we're doing everything we can to attract them, including spending tax money.
Just a stone's throw from my house, Walgreen's is building a store. To help with the flow of traffic into and out of the parking lot, the city is widening a street to the tune of $1 million.
According to a story in the Rolla Daily News in June:

This first phase of the extension’s construction will involve only the frontage of the Walgreens drug store.
The project will be completed by the City of Rolla’s Public Works Department. Traffic control will be coordinated by the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT).
The right of way for the portion of street adjacent to the Walgreen’s property was donated by Walgreens, and MoDOT contributed the design for this first phase of construction.
(Public Works Director Steve) Hargis estimates a total cost of $200,000-to-$250,000 for the first phase, and it includes costs for labor, concrete pavement and curbs. This is in addition to the Walgreens and MoDOT contributions.
The total cost of constructing the extension from U.S. Route 63 to Walker would be approximately $1 million, Hargis said.
Hargis did not know a timetable for the completion of the rest of the extension.
“We’re in the process of working with HNTB Inc. (consulting engineers) of Kansas City, to develop a master plan, go over some financing options and determine how the project might be timed,” Hargis said.

That's $1 million of mostly public tax money to pay for what amounts to an entrance to a privately owned business. In exchange, Rolla will likely lose one or two of its three locally owned pharmacies. The Walgreen's photo department might even put the home-owned photo developer downtown out of business. That's a small price to pay for the convenience of having a 24-hour pharmacy.
Maybe the owners and employees of the pharmacies and the downtown photo job can find jobs at Walgreen's. We don't want them to be jobless. After all, they need an income so they pay taxes in Rolla--taxes that we need to help us attract more business.

Rain two consecutive nights

I dumped half an inch of precip from my rain gauge at 5:30 a.m. today.

I dumped 2 inches at 5:30 a.m. yesterday, but I'm not sure if that was accurate. I watered the new iris bed I planted for my wife and the rain gauge is right next to it. Perhaps some of the spray got into the gauge, so it's possible we didn't get 2 inches of rain. We got a lot of rain, though; I suspect it was nearly 2 inches, and we needed every 10th of it.

We need Sarah Steelman's conservative principles

Voting in the Republican primary Tuesday, I cast only one vote. All the local candidates were unopposed, so I didn't mark their names, and I didn't know enough about the candidates for lieutenant governor to make an informed choice, so I left that one blank, too. For the GOP nomination for governor, I voted for Sarah Steelman, because she seemed to me to be a real Republican.

A friend at work was talking about the election at lunch today and he said that he, too, voted for Steelman. "I've only talked to her once," he said, "but she reminds me of Ronald Reagan."

I agree; Steelman seems to me to be a conservative first and a Republican second. That's what we need in government: a principled conservative.

Instead, the Republican voters gave us Hulshof.

Rolla newspaper columnist seems to endorse Obama

I quite possibly fell asleep and woke up in another dimension, perhaps the Twilight Zone. I say that because the local newspaper has gone goofy for Obama. As noted in a previous entry in this diary, the paper waxed poetic about the preparations for Obama's visit to Rolla last week. I discovered (a week late) that Publisher Emeritus Stephen E. Sowers is backing Obama for president. Sowers headlined his column Thursday (yes, that was a week ago, but I just don't keep up on the local news as I probably should): "It was fantastic having Barack Obama in Rolla."

He went on to write:

I have not attended many political rallies in my near 50 years as a newspaper person, but I never before heard about or experienced anything like what I witnessed in our town on Wednesday.
It was amazing. It was incredible. And it was fantastic for Rolla ... The people I saw at the rally all seemed to have a hopeful look in their eye. They are anxious for a change and they think Obama is the person to bring about serious, necessary changes. They appear to already revere Obama and he is not yet president.
Obama generates major excitement in a crowd. He is articulate, dynamic and he speaks with substance, no matter what some may say, about the important issues facing our country.
If his supporters have elevated him to rock-star or movie-star status, so be it. I like that. I think it is good for the country to have a large segment of the population excited about the changes that Obama promises for 2009 and beyond. And truly believe he can pull it off.
"Change we can believe in." That is the message we hear wherever Obama goes. It is the message resonating throughout the country.
I'm hearing it. And now I'm believing the Obama plan just might work.
I'm believing also that Obama deserves a chance to show us what he can do. The other side has had eight years to lead us, and, frankly, the results are not good.
Best of luck in your venture, Senator Obama!
By the way, senator, having met you, we're already doing better in Rolla.

Is that an endorsement? Sounds like one to me.

Sowers endorsed Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole and George W. Bush. Now he's endorsing Barack Hussein Obama. That's what is really amazing and incredible.

Daily papers cutting Monday publication

Editor & Publisher, the trade journal for the newspaper business, reports today that GateHouse Media, which owns many papers in Missouri, is dropping Monday editions on several newspapers. The article reads in part:

The McPherson (Kan.) Sentinel said Wednesday it is dropping its Monday edition, making the paper the latest GateHouse Media Inc.-owned daily to drop Mondays in cutting costs.

"With skyrocketing newsprint and fuel prices, the writing was on the wall that we were going to have to do something drastic to keep our expenses in line," Publisher Gary Mehl said in a statement. "To cut one publishing day has been one of the most difficult decisions of my 43-year career at The Sentinel.

The Sentinel will not publish next Monday and will become a five-day paper, publishing Tuesdays through Saturdays.

Other GateHouse papers in Kansas are also dropping "at least" one publishing day, Mehl said, including The Augusta Daily Gazette; The Derby Reporter; The El Dorado Times; and the Wellington Daily News.

Two GateHouse papers in Illinois announced in recent weeks they are dropping Monday editions.

If it's happening to papers on either side of the Show-Me State, when will the cuts begin here?

GateHouse Media closed at 69 cents per share today, according to MSN.

I missed the Rolla visit of the counterfeit messiah

Nope, I didn't go see the Missouri BO Townhall in Rolla. I won't vote for the Illinois senator, so I wouldn't bother going to see or hear him. If you're interested in the visit, then surely by now you've found the St. Louis Post-Dispatch report.

I was a little taken aback by the Rolla Daily News coverage of the preparations for the visit. After running nothing but a wire story about the announcement of the visit earlier in the week, the paper came back Tuesday night with egregious cheerleading. Here's the lead paragraph to the story: "Obama-mania has hit Rolla."
Oh, really?
The next few paragraphs are straight, but then we get this reporting: "The response to Obama’s visit has been phenomenal." Yep, the writer said "phenomenal."
That got him so wound up that he left me slack-jawed with this prose:

There were mothers with children in strollers.
There were young people.
There were people under umbrellas, seeking refuge from the July sun.
The elderly were there, too.
There were mothers. Fathers.
Grandparents.
Some had agendas, others just wanted to deliver a message...

The RDN writer should be forgiven for that silliness. It's an exciting time for most everybody else around here in Rolla, I guess.

I'm just a little uneasy about the future of the country, so if I forgive you for acting so goofy, will you please forgive my reluctance to join in the celebration?