WLOSers were pretty lame at 10. First up was a story about how they revealed the local connection of freed death row inmate Glenn Chapman. The connection, as I revealed in yesterday’s blog post (below) is that Chapman has an attorney, Frank Goldsmith, who has an office in Marion. WLOSers won’t actually interview Goldsmith until Friday.
Next, WLOSers teased a story about Gary Hilton making a “scene” in a court room because he’s fighting extradition, but there was no explanation of any “scene.”
Then Russ said gas prices went up today. Well that’s good – I’m glad WLOSers looked at the signs at the gas stations. Prices shot up like 8 or 9 cents today. There was something about truckers pulling over to protest gas prices.
O, and WLOSers said that Stewart Coleman will fight on to try and get his Parkside condo project approved. He lost in a 3-3 tie vote at the city’s planning and zoning commission meeting last night. He proposes to build a big building on City/County Plaza just a stone’s throw from City Hall.
Coleman has every right to take his project all the way to City Council, and here’s my guess at how the vote appears to be breaking: Council members Bill Russell, Jan Davis and Carl Mumpower vote yes, while Holly Jones, Brownie Newman and Robin Cape vote no. That leaves Mayor Terry Bellamy as the swing.
Just my guess.
At 11, WLOSers took the angle of the folks at Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church opposing Coleman’s project. They don’t want the big condo building “blocking out The Block,” said the Rev. James Grant, referring to the historic African-American business district in downtown.
Then WLOSers segued from condos to all the new hotels being planned and built in downtown Asheville. They noted that the old Best Western downtown on Woodfin Street has been renovated and renamed the Four Points by Sheraton.
3 Comments
It’ll die, 6 to 1.
Russell will vote for it, everyone else against.
G-man, you know this issue way better than me – I defer to you. Anyone who wants to read up on Parkside needs to go to Scrutiny Hooligans and read what Gordan has been posting. Go now.
http://www.scrutinyhooligans.us
I’m thinking that Carl Mumpower and possibly Bill Russell will also vote against the project. Given the residents of The Block who opposed the thing at P&Z, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the mayor vote against it too.
Mumpower knows this is public land. Russell knows the dirtiness of the deal and is probably acutely aware of how voting in favor of one of his biggest campaign donor’s very controversial project might appear.
I think this thing goes down 5-2 or 6-1. If the Performing Arts Center group is against it, then Davis votes against it too.