The Ruminator Handout

I've always liked Ruminator Books. Although the store and its management are relentlessly DFL-PC, and they host readings from some of the most obnoxious left-wingers (Michael Moore and Paul Krugman are recent guests), it's a just-plain-good bookstore...

...apparently run by some just-plain bad management. Ruminator's troubles are long-standing and well-known. The store is hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt.

So Ward 4 City Councilman Jay Benanav is proposing giving the store $150,000 in city money in the form of low-interest loans and grants, as the Fraters noted the other day.

The "loan" and gift has drawn a bit of discussion on E-Democracy's "Saint Paul Issues" mailing list. The lines are drawn - between 20% on the one hand who say the city has no business handing out money to any business, 20% on the other who say that not only should the city not give out money to private business, they really really really should't give out money to rich capitalists, and 60% in the middle who really really really really hate giving money to capitalists, but note that David Unowski is a good liberal so maybe we should make an exception.

As one correspondent - a local "progressive" stalwart - said:

When Ruminator asks the city for millions of dollars, then you can raise eyebrows and complain about the lack of equal treatment or favoritism towards only certain businesses in town. But I could find the amount of money that Ruminator needs in attorneys fees that the city paid out to do the Wild Arena deal, so this is really a disingenuous comparison. Ruminator is admittedly a place where progressives feel more at home than City Hall or Barnes & Noble, but you know what, if you look at the voting in the last election, this is an overwhelmingly democratic city. Why can't the people who are in the majority get something they want once in a while, as opposed to all the backroom deals that suck away the downtown property tax base?

I opposed the Wild deal, and I oppose the Ruminator deal. As a taxpayer, I'll raise my eyebrows and complain any time I want to - the St. Paul DFL hasn't yet gotten a law passed requiring prior approval.

And I don't care who the people of St. Paul vote

And I oppose my "representative", Jay Benanav. The main criteria for getting city aid from Benanav seems to be "be a known DFL supporter". Last year, Benanav brokered a deal to sell a residential lot - worth over $26,000 on the open market - to a local businesswoman and neighborhood DFL leader, for roughly $8000 in back taxes. The sale - basically, a $16,000 gift - was justified under "neighborhood beautification"; the woman used the lot ot make room for an addition to her kitchen and porch, and for an extra-huge lawn. It's beautiful all right; but the city would have benefitted much more by allowing the lot to be sold for market value, and letting someone erect a tax-generating house on the property.

Not on Jay Benanav's watch. Paying off patronage is what it's about.

Stay tuned.

Posted by Mitch at January 26, 2004 07:25 AM