Go ahead and get a good chuckle over the idea of turning the troubled Mecklenburg Mills site into a sort of artists commune in NoDa. Finished? The idea actually makes a weird kind of sense.
The first priority is to get the property — all vacant real estate, really — away from the city and into the private sector. If a non-profit like Artspsace can take the property, get it up to code, and start paying some kind of taxes on it — all without any public money — great. That’s a net gain. They can do whatever they want there; define “artists” eligible to live there any way they want or do it by lotto — who cares.
The city just needs to stop spending money on the property before we hit the $7 million mark.
Second, there is the not small issue of the fact that the city is already in the business of subsidizing artists and art projects — what do you call the $157 million Wachovia Arts Tower? Tens of millions in General Fund revenues — property tax money — are going to pay for that and Mayor Pat McCrory and the city council thinks it is great. Economic development yadda yadda synergy yadda yadda. Why not toss an old building worth maybe a few million to the NoDa crowd and have another pep rally?
Because pep rallies are for Uptown, not NoDa. The bankers and their wives call the shots, not the urchins huddled up by the railroad tracks. This is Charlotte. The city would never just hand over a building to a bunch of artists — unless the bankers said it was OK.
So let’s be clear on this, the city should sign over title to Artspace tomorrow and walk away forever — no affordable housing this, or overseeing that. The city has a reverse Midas touch.
Just don’t name the damn thing Cityfair.
