{"id":11577,"date":"2015-11-12T22:20:01","date_gmt":"2015-11-12T22:20:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=11577"},"modified":"2015-11-12T22:20:01","modified_gmt":"2015-11-12T22:20:01","slug":"how-do-we-define-organic-growth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=11577","title":{"rendered":"How do we define &#8216;organic growth&#8217;?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/amarillo-downtown.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-10971\" src=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/amarillo-downtown-300x157.jpg\" alt=\"amarillo downtown\" width=\"300\" height=\"157\" srcset=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/amarillo-downtown-300x157.jpg 300w, https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/amarillo-downtown.jpg 915w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Amarillo City Councilman Mark Nair is a bright young man who speak at times in somewhat academic terms about public policy.<\/p>\n<p>For example, I have heard\u00a0the City Council freshman\u00a0use the term &#8220;organic growth&#8221; to describe how he&#8217;d like to see downtown Amarillo grow.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m not sure how one defines &#8220;organic growth&#8221; as it pertains to commercial development. But here&#8217;s what I&#8217;ve witnessed in the city&#8217;s downtown business district since my wife and I moved here more than 20 years ago.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The transition of the historic Fisk building into a\u00a0business hotel.<\/li>\n<li>The development of several bank plazas: Happy State Bank and Wells Fargo come to mind.<\/li>\n<li>The revitalization of the Potter County Courthouse Square.<\/li>\n<li>Expansion and improvements at several downtown-area churches.<\/li>\n<li>A new convenience store.<\/li>\n<li>Development of the Eagle Center into downtown residences.<\/li>\n<li>Several new nightspots and nice lunchtime eating establishments along Polk Street.<\/li>\n<li>Returning the Paramount Building neon sign and the occupancy of the old structure.<\/li>\n<li>Complete renovation and restoration of the Santa Fe Building for use by several Potter County offices.<\/li>\n<li>Construction of a state-of-the-art entertainment center across the street from the Civic Center.<\/li>\n<li>A higher education institution, which is moving soon from the Chase Tower to a new location in the downtown business district.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I no doubt have missed something. My point is that downtown Amarillo is in much better condition today than it was when my wife and I landed here in early 1995.<\/p>\n<p>The vast majority of that improvement has been done with private money. The state kicked in historic preservation grant money to re-do the exterior of the county courthouse and the Santa Fe Building; Potter County issued certificate of obligation to do the rest.<\/p>\n<p>The city has kicked in some public money for infrastructure improvements, such as sidewalks and curb cuts at street corners.<\/p>\n<p>Xcel Energy has begun construction of a new office complex. Ground has been broken on a new convention hotel.<\/p>\n<p>A multipurpose event venue &#8212; which Councilman Nair and others on the council apparently oppose &#8212; might be built next to City Hall. Then again, it might not &#8230; depending on how much foot-dragging and delay tactics occur at the City Council and Local Government Corp. level.<\/p>\n<p>Organic growth?<\/p>\n<p>It seems to this layman&#8217;s eyes that downtown has grown pretty <em>organically<\/em> already.<\/p>\n<p>I also should point out that the city&#8217;s municipal tax rate is still dirt cheap at around 35 cents per $100 of assessed property valuation.<\/p>\n<p>Yes, more needs to be done.<\/p>\n<p>But my question today is: What on Earth has caused all these expressions of distrust, anger and suspicion at City Hall?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Amarillo City Councilman Mark Nair is a bright young man who speak at times in somewhat academic terms about public policy. For example, I have heard\u00a0the City Council freshman\u00a0use the term &#8220;organic growth&#8221; to describe how he&#8217;d like to see downtown Amarillo grow. I&#8217;m not sure how one defines &#8220;organic growth&#8221; as it pertains to &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=11577\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">How do we define &#8216;organic growth&#8217;?<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[288,290,1436,2915],"class_list":["post-11577","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-amarillo-city-council","tag-amarillo-city-hall","tag-downtown-amarillo","tag-mark-nair"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11577","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11577"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11577\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11578,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11577\/revisions\/11578"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}