By Ronnie Herne
In a full-page ad in The World last Saturday, Frank Williams urges us to lobby every government official we can find to expedite the building of new shipping terminals in Coos Bay, arguing: ”Build the docks and they will come.”
Whoa, Frank! Been there, done that. Over and over and over again for the last forty years.
Back in the mid-seventies, the port of Coos Bay bought a derelict vessel, the Crosline Ferry, to rent to various businesses. None showed up. The price tag was $100,000.
In 1979 the port built the T-Dock, to attract fish processors to the North Spit. No processors came. Price tag on the idle T-dock: $2.5 million.
Back then also, the port built two fish plants in Charleston. Both went broke. One still stands empty.
Around 1981 the port offered to sponsor $150 million of tax-free bonds for a huge coal shipping terminal promoted by speculators who even sold shares to local investors. Lucky for Coos Bay, the plan collapsed. The Port of Portland did build a coal export terminal, but it never exported one clinker of coal.
About 1985 the port dug a $ 1.5 million barge slip on the North Spit. It was supposed to attract Alaska North Slope steel fabricators, but none ever came. It also built a $4 million 4-mile road to serve the port’s “industrial park” out there. It took ten years to attract DB Western, an existing local industry.
In 1986 the port bought Emery Hanson’s landing in Charleston, to build a dock for the Coast Guard. But the dock was on the wrong side of the bridge, and unusable. The port lost $322,000 during the first year.
At the beginning of the 90’s the port wasted millions on water supply studies to lure a new pulp mill that, thankfully, never came.
Then the port financed a “Coos County potato industry”. But the potato market collapsed, and the farm went belly up.
In 2002/2003 the port spent $200,000 for two feasibility studies for a new cargo dock on the North Spit. Both strongly advised against it, politely calling it “a very high business risk”.
Still Frank Williams thinks that Coos Bay, a shallow, water-filled hole in the ground, can yet become a World Port. “Build it and they will come.” The cure for such near-sighted fancy foolishness may well be Wim de Vriend’s very funny, very factual, historically well-documented book “The JOB Messiahs”. This is a forty year romp through the vagaries of lost public monies through under-planned, ill-planned, and not-planned-at-all port fiascos. If you want to read it, Frank, I’ll even buy you the copy.
I got in a hurry, its
http://350.org/
Wow Frank,those are big numbers your throwing out there.It Sounds like the hyperbole is ramping up by promising all those millions to everybody. Its also sad that you spent your personal fortune to bring LNG to us.
I understand you believe you are saving the children’s future by bringing this here. That is why we are fighting you. The kids deserve better than to have their future sold out to industrial developers. If you Educate yourself on climate change you will know that you are asking everyone to endorse the destruction of the climate for profit. Go to 360.org for starters, and listen to people who are smarter than you.
For those that don’t believe a recent tour of LA Harbor, shows that one out of five docks pays the port of LA $350 million dollars per year rent.
When Jordan Cove starts up the three docks on North Spit, it will bring in 900-2000 jobs in addition to 1400 on the pipelines. 25 million will fund our local schools through a trust fund and approximately 20 million will go to Coos County Tax.
There will be approximately 500 kids graduating from Coos County schools this year, with no local jobs to keep them in the area.
If I didn’t care about the bay area or it’s future, I wouldn’t be spending my retirement or my money fighting for our county.
The same promises, practically word for word, were made by Cheniere Energy before the construction of the Sabine Pass LNG Import terminal and are now being repeated with its export facility. Do some homework, Frank, and go see how well LNG has worked out for the people of Cameron Parish, LA and Port Arthur, Texas. If you have a mind to go and see how it worked out for Nigeria and Sahkalin Islands and you might know why many of us don’t believe a word BS Oregon and Jordan Cove say.
Boy that is some good writing, thank you Wim.
I’m still not all the way through the book, best reading I’ve had in a long time.
It sure feels good to know my first impressions of the Port were spot on. The constant bleating of the SCDC crowd makes one some times think they are the only ones seeing the truth. I’m very grateful you took so much time to write this. I hope you sent one to the Ports’ Enablers in Salem-and Eugene.
Dear Arnold:
You say you don’t want to know about my book, but you do want to know if I favor “zero or negative job growth,” and whether one can “encourage job growth without being labeled a “Messiah”.
Well – there’s none so blind as those that won’t read. But let me help you out.
I am pro-economic growth and pro-jobs, but the ways in which those I call the JOB Messiahs have been pursuing those things are asinine and useless. Worse, they have set this area back. They have obstructed positive, sound, gradual development of the kind that’s been achieved all up and down the coast, and they have scared people off. Thanks to their incompetence Coos County – except for Bandon – has been the only part of western Oregon that’s lost population, a sure sign of our economic decline. And it didn’t have to be that way.
The JOB Messiahs get away with their malpractice because of a false religion that’s been preached here for thirty-five years. Frank Williams’ rants are a simple re-hash of that worldly faith whose first dogma is that the Coos Bay harbor has tremendous economic potential. The truth is, people have said that about almost every water-filled hole on this coast, including – drum roll! – Floras Lake. But the people in those other places have come to their senses. Not so the people in Coos Bay.
The second dogma of this faith says that Coos Bay’s economic salvation will come about by attracting new, big, heavy, and usually dirty industries. This is called “economic development,” and it’s supposed to “create family-wage JOBS.” We’ve been waiting for those for a very long time. As my kids used to say on every car-trip: “Are we there yet? Why does it take so long?”
The third dogma says that industries can be seduced into coming here through mysterious forms of bribery practiced by the sophisticated JOB Messiahs at the Port of Coos Bay, SCDC, FONSI, CCD-EDC and – well, the list is near-endless. This bribery comes in many kinds. First there is money in the form of grants, subsidized loans, tax-exemptions and -credits. Then there are the many boondoggles built purely on spec. A boondoggle is something that was supposed to stimulate economic development, but doesn’t. Examples: the T-dock, the barge slip, the natural gas line, the railroad, and the many additional millions spent on studies for industries that never intended to come here in the first place.
The agencies’ officials go by various titles: economic development specialist, industrial recruiter, Executive Director of the Ridiculously Over-Titled Port of Coos Bay, and so on. I have called them JOB Messiahs because they pretend to be our economic saviors by creating JOBS. In reality they are no saviors. And the only jobs they create are their own, plus some for their relatives. And to be fair, those jobs do pay family-wages.
To most sensible economists, the JOB Messiahs’ dogmas are heresy; they know they don’t work. And I don’t know if you’re a religious man, but theologically they are heretical as well. That’s because they boil down to the idea that we can control the future, when we can’t, no more than we can control the weather. The best we can do is find out what we’ve been doing wrong, and remove the barriers to sensible economic development which governments at all levels have been feverishly erecting. All these things are covered in my book. For an example of government-erected barriers, see my article in The Sentinel of March 7.
It’s been said that the one thing that saves the politicians from being hanged is the American people’s short memories. The JOB Messiahs’ memories are better; that’s why most have short shelf-lives or, as one of them put it: “You’ve got to know when to get out.” Why do you think Jeff Bishop left the port of Coos Bay for a job in a dinky town in Oklahoma, with a fifty percent pay cut? He had milked the taxpayers for all he could, and none of his sensational schemes had panned out.
If you want to find out what can and cannot improve our economy, get the book. It’s available at the Sentinel office, at Books-by-the-bay, and at my restaurant. At $29 for twenty years of work, it’s a steal. But if you can’t afford that, the Coos Bay and the North Bend libraries have one, as does the Coos Historical Museum.
I think the point is, is this man using public funds for his own litter box.
So really Wim aside, I understand he has a book for sale as this seems to be a theme here, but more to the first two and last paragraphs of twelve what about Frank Williams? I would like a little more info about this person and not so much about Wim’s book.
Now is this aim for the author zero or negative job growth? Is it possible to encourage job growth without being labeled a “Messiah”?
If you ever watched Mr. Williams on Coos Media/PEG, it’s scary thinking people take him seriously. I don’t know if his program “Concerned Citizens of Coos County” is still listed, but his interview with Dan Varjoun (A FONSI member) is eye opening to the thinking of these narrow minded dimwits.
Dear Frankie:
Why did PEG Broadcast Services buy that full page ad? I’m in the boonies; but, I did not fall off of the turnip truck and decide to stay here.
If you want to remain a tax exempt organization may I suggest that you familiarize yourself with federal law.
Reference http://www.irs.gov/charities/charitable/article
IRS law governing 501(c) organizations – one of which you claim to be, states “organizations are restricted in how much political and legislative (lobbying) activities they may conduct”. You are doing plenty! See the article titled “Lobbying Issues”.
Perhaps it’s time for you who eats all meals at the public trough to conduct yourself in accordance with the law.
SIncerely,
Ima