OEV’s 10-year scorecard: Few deals, conflicting numbers, little accountability
The Tallahassee-Leon Office of Economic Vitality turned 10 years old at the end of February. […]
Author: redtape
Posts by redtape
Sidewalk of Doom, meet the Sidewalk to Nowhere
Just a couple of hundred yards north of Midtown Reader — where a recent Red Tape Florida series told the story of a sad plot of grass which serves as a burial ground to common sense — you’ll find a different monument to bureaucratic ineptitude. […]
Midtown Reader’s nightmare proves Tallahassee’s permitting system is broken
Sally Bradshaw just wanted to add 700 square feet to her bookstore. And she was willing to pay $850,000 to buy the lot next door to make it happen. […]
The Amazing Adventures of Midtown Reader and the Sidewalk of Doom: Full series
This is a three-part story about a bookstore, a city, and a process that few people ever see until they are in it. It includes hundreds of emails, unwritten rules, unexpected requirements, and a $150,000 sidewalk that raises larger questions about how decisions get made.[…]
City of Tallahassee: We will trade you Park Place for Free Parking
When we last saw Sally Bradshaw, she had survived months of deviations, secret menus of unwritten City rules and a mandatory bench in a pollinator garden. But the City still had one more move to make. The $150,000 Sidewalk of Doom was waiting. And so was a deal nobody could believe. […]
997 emails and a pollinator garden (with a mandatory water feature)
When we left our story in Part 1, it was late 2024 and the City of Tallahassee had just dropped a $150,000-plus sidewalk demand on a bookstore owner who just wanted to add 700 square feet. But that wasn’t where the adventure began. To understand the Sidewalk of Doom, we need to go back to the beginning. […]
How the City of Tallahassee threw the book at Midtown Reader
This is a story about 997 emails, a $150,000 sidewalk, an 8-eye-bolt bike rack and a parking lot that never got built.[…]
Your rent is high because your city commissioner wants it that way
Here is a number worth sitting with: 18.3 percent.
That is the share of income the typical Austin, Texas, renter now spends on rent — the lowest on record going back at least 20 years, according to housing analyst Nick Gerli of Reventure App. The typical Austin rent has dropped to $1,565 a month while the median income has climbed to $100,000. Apartment rents are down roughly 22 percent from their 2022 peak.[…]
Please stop saying ‘we don’t need another car wash’
There may be no more reliable sign of local Facebook economic illiteracy than the phrase: “We don’t need another car wash.” […]
Florida’s Local Governments Are Suing to Keep Your Rent High
Florida is short on housing. That’s not controversial. It’s arithmetic.[…]