FOR NOW MONARCH

There is so much going on in today's world. locally, nationally, and of course in the Mid-East Islamic nations that kindles one's interest and a desire to opine. Naturally, most of it arouses passions that sometimes exceed decency. C'est-la-vie. And, of course there is our almost daily report of a natural catastrophe somewheres on this globe.

Although I had started to write a "brief" essay-that is of course an oxymoron- about the Wisconsin/Indiana/New Jersey civil service's brouhahas it rapidly became too convoluted and verbose to even consider finishing or posting. However any cuts seemed to obscure any "argument" and thus rewriting, rewording and perhaps refocusing will be essential. Because of the multifaceted subject matter to shorten it to fill a space would make it in my opinion meaningless.

S0, please bear with me and and in a day or so I will start posting a two or more segment blog.

Of course we have our side tracks, and a late one came from Plaintalker's Wednesday evening post on the "Monarch". Two others appeared in Mark Spivey's blog which I did not see until late Wednesday; one about Senator Lautenberg's appearance at a Wednesday Morning Press Conference on Gun Control at City Hall, and the other a belated police report about a "severe beating" prob ably gang related that occurred Sunday.

Unfortunately, just a few days ago in a periodic cleaning of old non personally essential documents I destroyed my copy of the City's Agreement with Dornoch through UCIA that led to the Planning Board approval and City permission to construct a luxury condo building on East Front Street with the provision the developer providing for a dollar a permanent Senior Citizen's Center space that the City would own as a condo.

Nowheres in the agreement was a mentioned that the units could be used as rentals. To the best of my knowledge there has been no resolution offered by the Council to permit such usage. For the Developer to now "Rent them with the provision to purchase" is illegal.

The Developer has not lived up to many of the terms of the building contract, and now he is committing a fraud upon those that purchased units in good face.

But there are many unanswered questions. A few are; was a Certificate of Occupancy issued for the entire building or just for the occupied condo units? I believe that this was so stated by Corporation Counsel late in 2009 or early 2010 when the question of the "new" Dornoch charge for the SCC was raised and if the SCC or any part of the building had received a Certificate of Occoupancy. The Senior Citizen's Center is one of the condos. The sold condos appeared on the tax roles once certified. The Monarch itself was exempt from taxes as an occupied commercial enterprise. Since it is now an rental enterprise should it not be liable for taxation once a certificate of occupancy was granted to any portion.? What happens to the Veterans' Center which was to be turned over to the city once all units were sold? That provision now seems not to be worth the paper it was written on. Since the city sold the property to UCIA for $1.00 and they facilitated the contract between Dornoch and the City does UCIA have a responsibility? Who is responsible for maintenance, Dornoch,the Condo Owners including the City, or all? If all how will responsibility be allocated? These are only an immediate few.

The City has an obligation to its taxpayers to take all legal methods to enforce the developer to live up to his agreement. It also should in effect at the least to consider becoming a partner with those that purchased units from this apparent con artist in their pursuit of redress.

An Anoni writing to PalintalkerII wrote "So it would be better for the units to sit vacant?". That is not the question. There is no questuion that it would be better for the City if it is 100% occupied. Even more serious;the problem is at least two fold. The first is the City's approval for construction as "condos' not "rentals". This could be a zoning board violation, it certainly is a violation of the Planning Boards approval. The other and as important relates those that purchased units either at the original inflated price or the few later at a market price. Are they victims of a con game?

The terms for the building may be read in this old blog . click  here