The Observation Deck

201019.94
201014.09
200918.72
200912.45
200817.18
200812.24
200714.97
200711.46

Bill===== What the F*** are you talking about now????????

Some kind of city ordinance code that lets only union affiliated aliens into the ER at CCF?

Stan Austin wrote:Bill===== What the F*** are you talking about now????????

Those numbers tell us a great deal about many things. Look closely.

I think it's BIll's salary.

how did you know that is how much debt the rescue has? are you sneaking up on me? LOL.

It's either:

A) The increasing trend of the number of unionized government workers needed to screw in a light bulb.

B) The high and low of Bill's favorite stock

C) Average number of felonies committed (allegedly) by former and soon to be former Cuyahoga County elected politicians

D) Average number of 'free' tattoos for OSU football players over the last four years

OK,OK I'll give it a shot-----the four digits on the right reflect percentages of some budget devoted to some public employee's pension.

Stan Austin wrote:OK,OK I'll give it a shot-----the four digits on the right reflect percentages of some budget devoted to some public employee's pension.

No. The $20 million per year the City and Schools will need to fully fund the public employee pensions are a subject for another day. Although, I'm tempted to discuss how someone who never invested more than $150,000 in a pension plan can collect $80,000 per year with cost of living increases for 30 years or more plus free health care.

These are the 3rd quarter business vacancy rates:

2010 19.94% Lakewood
2010 14.09% Cuyahoga County

2009 18.72% Lakewood
2009 12.45% Cuyahoga County

2008 17.18% Lakewood
2008 12.24% Cuyahoga County

2007 14.97% Lakewood
2007 11.46% Cuyahoga County

It would be fun to discuss the County's plan to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to subsidize the construction of new office space when so much existing space is vacant
but I'll save that for another day.


It's time to think about what the City spends on its development department, building department and its subsidy of Lakewood Alive. I think we can do better.

Bill----Very interesting topic and definitely worthy of discussion.

However, those numbers appear strange. First of all, what is the definition of a business? Does it also include sites zoned industrial? I ask those questions because at first blush it would seem that the county's percentage because of the inclusion of Cleveland would be much higher than Lakewood's.
Also, for the Lakewood numbers, I seem to recall a recent article by Melissa Garrett stating that the storefront vacancy rate was about 3%. For the numbers you presented to be accurate there would have to be 1 out of 5 storefronts (if that's the definition of a business) vacant. I just don't see that on Madison or Detroit.
I do agree that the performance or lack thereof of the Building, Planning and Development and Lakewood Alive.
Finally, let me throw a curve ball in here. I assume you, Bill, are a free market believer. If so, then why should any level of government be involved in what is a private individual's decision to take on risk by investing in property which may or may not provide rental return on investment?

Stan

Stan Austin wrote:Bill----Very interesting topic and definitely worthy of discussion.

However, those numbers appear strange. First of all, what is the definition of a business? Does it also include sites zoned industrial? I ask those questions because at first blush it would seem that the county's percentage because of the inclusion of Cleveland would be much higher than Lakewood's.

The vacancy rates come from data compiled by the US Post Office. A business address is any address in a commercial building including store fronts and office buildings. My guess is that most of the vacancies are in Lakewood's downtown office space.

One floor of an office building can be one address or it can be many addresses so the numbers themselves can be a bit misleading. However, the numbers are computed in a consistant manner over time and location so they are a good way to compare and to see trends.


Lakewood is in a County that is in a State that is in a region that is losing population and economic power. It's a waste of time to expect any help from the nation, the State or the County.

I had some hope the County would fight the trends. When I found out that Tri-C was locating its new campus in an industrial park in Westlake I new the game was over. Further confirmation came when I found that improvements to Madison Avenue where killed.


We are on our own. Which means we should reconsider how we spend our few development dollars. I've got some ideas but but I think discussing them would be a waste of time. I'll probably do it anyway.

Bill Call wrote:

Stan Austin wrote:Bill----Very interesting topic and definitely worthy of discussion.

However, those numbers appear strange. First of all, what is the definition of a business? Does it also include sites zoned industrial? I ask those questions because at first blush it would seem that the county's percentage because of the inclusion of Cleveland would be much higher than Lakewood's.

The vacancy rates come from data compiled by the US Post Office. A business address is any address in a commercial building including store fronts and office buildings. My guess is that most of the vacancies are in Lakewood's downtown office space.

One floor of an office building can be one address or it can be many addresses so the numbers themselves can be a bit misleading. However, the numbers are computed in a consistant manner over time and location so they are a good way to compare and to see trends.


Lakewood is in a County that is in a State that is in a region that is losing population and economic power. It's a waste of time to expect any help from the nation, the State or the County.

I had some hope the County would fight the trends. When I found out that Tri-C was locating its new campus in an industrial park in Westlake I new the game was over. Further confirmation came when I found that improvements to Madison Avenue where killed.


We are on our own. Which means we should reconsider how we spend our few development dollars. I've got some ideas but but I think discussing them would be a waste of time. I'll probably do it anyway.

Bill,

I wonder, just how many square feet of office space does Lakewood's vacancy rate represent? And, is Lakewood's supply of commercial square footage considered to be of unique kind and quality? Is Lakewood really comparable to the rest of Cuyahoga County?

Scott Meeson

I wonder how much of out office space is ready for the new technology enabled business we will need in the future. While I agree it is a waste of time to wait for anybody else to solve our problems, I would welcome help to improve our infrastructure.

Two "case studies" from an insiders point of view. My employer recently moved into some "new" (to us) office space in Rocky River. The voice and data infrastructure was not there too meet our needs. We paid AT&T a crazy amount of money (biggest single check I have ever seen) to run new conduit from the street all the way to or new offices.

We also lease space in a prominent downtown office building. We recently moveed to a new WAN technology. (MetroE for those who are interested) Again the infrastructure was not in place. We had to pay again a crazy amount of money to obtain the service we needed.

Just some thoughts. Still waiting to hear about the Lakewood Municipal Fiber Collective.

Scott Meeson wrote:I wonder, just how many square feet of office space does Lakewood's vacancy rate represent? And, is Lakewood's supply of commercial square footage considered to be of unique kind and quality? Is Lakewood really comparable to the rest of Cuyahoga County?

Scott Meeson

I don't know but I'll answer anyway.

The UPS only lists business addresses and not industrial addresses. A single office with one address in a Lakewood store front is one address. A business that occupies one whole floor in a large office space is also one address. The numbers are more useful as indicators than as absolutes.

The business vacancy rate in Westlake is 13.66% and 14.25% in Beachwood. We have a regional over supply of office space but our "regional" leaders are spending $250 million tax dollars to construct more while they are also sigining on to the widening of I-77 to open up land for development in Northern Summit County.

I try not to be too critical of the decisions made by Lakewoods council and Mayor because I realize they are fighting against economic trends reinforced by billions of tax dollars whose sole purpose is to empy out existing communities. It would be nice if some of our "regional" institutions which work against that trend instead of working for it. I'm resigned to the fact that they just won't do it. We are on our own.

Although, I like the idea of fighting a guerilla war against those regional institutions.

I think we can better allocate the development dollars we have and find synergies in combining departments and demaning more from Lakewood Alive. The roll model for Lakewood Alive should be the Detroit Shoreway Development organization.
The roll model for City deveopment and housing departments should be

Bill, you keep saying you think we can do better, but you haven't given any examples as to how? I'm curious what you think should or could be done differently?