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Old 05-06-2009, 04:25 PM
 
947 posts, read 1,635,843 times
Reputation: 415

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Quote:
Originally Posted by go phillies View Post
Nay Aug still is a dump....after Doherty gets the photo op next to a new project, he lets it rot. Go check out the playground that Doherty put in down the hill from the zoo.....broken equipment, a sandbox with no sand but full of garbage. Take a walk towards the gorge on the expensive Davis Trail...the trail is so eroded you can hardly walk on it, its full of huge ruts. Check out the playground near the front of the park, its falling apart and covered with graffiti. Weston Park is still a dump. My son played soccer there...full of garbage and graffiti.

For all the money that Doherty dumped into Nay Aug, it should look like Disney World. Instead, it looks more like "Krabby Land" from an episode of Spongebob where cheapskate Mr. Krabs put in a junky old playground:







Scranton was also rated as one of the "Fastest Dying Cities" just this past year by Forbes magazine: In Pictures: America's Fastest-Dying Cities - Forbes.com If the population actually grew, that's strange, because I'm seeing more For Sale signs on houses than ever. There's 3 for sale on my small block alone. And if the population has been growing, its the low-rent druggies from NY/NJ/Philly...there does seem to be a major increase in those types in Scranton. But Doherty doesn't have to worry about those types of people, they're not living next to his ivory tower in Green Ridge.



A new police HQ was needed, but this one is still too small to fit all of the PD's departments, and of course was built with crony labor....I'm sure there were kickbacks....(kickbacks are why slimy politicians like Doherty love construction projects). Trust me, the FD does not need cutbacks...West Side, with a population of near 25,000 by itself, has one fire station manned by only 2 firefighters at a time. That is ridiculous.

Seriously, go to Radio Shack and buy yourself a police scanner, you'll get the real story of what's happening to Scranton. Rampant, nonstop crime, and a police department that is severely stretched thin.

I have to ask, do you live in the city of Scranton or have you ever lived in Scranton? It seems the mayor's biggest cheerleaders are usually from outside the city.
Yes, I lived in Scranton for decades and then I was transferred out of the area. I have lived all over the country for the past ten years. I was relocated back to the east coast with my job and I do live in Scranton-in the downtown to be exact. I lived in the downtown of another city with a larger population in another city and they had the same ratio as Scranton so this isn;t just a problem with the Mayor. And I have been to Nay Aug within the past few months and I have not seen any of the garbage you speak of in your post.

As for the downtown, The downtown would prosper more and create more jobs if people in this city supported them completely instead of heading up to Dickson City, Tannersville or Moosic to the malls and outlets.

As far as crime goes, it's perception. I don't see bank robberies, murders and rapes being reported here on a daily basis. You do in Philly and the last city I lived in had quite a few murders each month and bank robberies picked up last year including one that happened across the street from my home and another which ended in a shoot out with the police right outside my office window.

Do I agree with everything the mayor does? No but he's not the devil some make him out to be. I seldom watch the city council meetings because of the inappropriate behavior and verbal abuse that is thrown at city council each week by some, not all, of those who speak during fifth order but I did catch about a half hour either last week or the week before when members of city council were rebutting some comments and talking about some website where people post under cover- is this the site and are you one of those who are always at the city council meetings?

I noticed that some of the posters on this site write like some speak at the city council meetings.
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Old 05-06-2009, 05:20 PM
 
Location: Sheeptown, USA
3,236 posts, read 6,628,520 times
Reputation: 907
Come on shoegal, you have some pretty strong rose-colored glasses. I'm not here to insult you or anything like that. It's just that gophillies and my perception is a little more real than yours. I have nothing personally against the mayor, I don't know him and I'm not a native of Scranton, so I don't have any connections with any politician here. I have no reason to bash Scranton. I just look at it and after living here for 7 seven years, it doesn't look all that great to me. Nay Aug does not look good, considering all the money Doherty pumped into it. It should look much, much better. The downtown would prosper more if Doherty got rid of the high wage and mercantile tax. No business wants to go downtown because of it. And yes sadly, the crime rate is rising in Scranton because the mayor keeps cutting public safety. He is spending, spending, spending and the city is getting less safer everyday. There are a lot of "FOR SALE" signs in the city, I see them everyday. That tells me a lot people beside myself want out. I don't watch the council meetings anymore because I have the dish, but they do make for good entertainment.
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Old 05-06-2009, 06:52 PM
 
703 posts, read 1,539,862 times
Reputation: 236
Quote:
Originally Posted by shoegal111 View Post
Do I agree with everything the mayor does? No but he's not the devil some make him out to be.
I'll admit that I'm not an avid follower of Scranton politics. The signal-to-noise ratio is atrocious. But I too have that impression about the Mayor. I get the feeling that he's at least doing something with the city: the 500 block of lackawanna project alone removed a huge piece of blight in our downtown. I don't really know what the Mayor can do to get us out of distressed city status or fix its other financial problems. Scranton is a dying city that's losing population every single year. At least the Mayor is doing something.
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Old 05-06-2009, 06:58 PM
 
Location: Sheeptown, USA
3,236 posts, read 6,628,520 times
Reputation: 907
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Commish View Post
I'll admit that I'm not an avid follower of Scranton politics. The signal-to-noise ratio is atrocious. But I too have that impression about the Mayor. I get the feeling that he's at least doing something with the city: the 500 block of lackawanna project alone removed a huge piece of blight in our downtown. I don't really know what the Mayor can do to get us out of distressed city status or fix its other financial problems. Scranton is a dying city that's losing population every single year. At least the Mayor is doing something.
For one, he should quit the excessive borrowing and spending. The Doherty Debt is huge.
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Old 05-06-2009, 07:34 PM
 
947 posts, read 1,635,843 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by NYRangers 2008 View Post
Come on shoegal, you have some pretty strong rose-colored glasses. I'm not here to insult you or anything like that. It's just that gophillies and my perception is a little more real than yours. I have nothing personally against the mayor, I don't know him and I'm not a native of Scranton, so I don't have any connections with any politician here. I have no reason to bash Scranton. I just look at it and after living here for 7 seven years, it doesn't look all that great to me. Nay Aug does not look good, considering all the money Doherty pumped into it. It should look much, much better. The downtown would prosper more if Doherty got rid of the high wage and mercantile tax. No business wants to go downtown because of it. And yes sadly, the crime rate is rising in Scranton because the mayor keeps cutting public safety. He is spending, spending, spending and the city is getting less safer everyday. There are a lot of "FOR SALE" signs in the city, I see them everyday. That tells me a lot people beside myself want out. I don't watch the council meetings anymore because I have the dish, but they do make for good entertainment.
There are lots of for sale signs for major two reasons: 1. the bank meltdown that led to the current recession and 2. properties being disposed of as part of an estate. As for no business wants to go downtown because of the taxes, I think Nada & Co., Lush, Kildare's seem to have no problem with it.

Also, if you have only lived here for 7 years then how would you know just how bad things were before the Dougherty administration since he has only been mayor for 7 years. South Side was a mess with crime long before Mayor Dougherty. That's been going on for about 20 years.

Also, crime rates do increase during recessions. Again, its not something specific to what the mayor is or is not doing and transplants from NJ, NY, Philly, etc. would tell you that this is a pretty safe place to live because of the low crime rate even now.

I am not seeing Scranton through rose colored glasses. I do believe some people in this town are fearful of change so they keep blinders on that prevents them from seeing what is really going on around them. It's easier to fight change than to embrace it. In the process of resisting/railing against, people just make themselves and those around them miserable.
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Old 05-06-2009, 07:36 PM
 
947 posts, read 1,635,843 times
Reputation: 415
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Commish View Post
I'll admit that I'm not an avid follower of Scranton politics. The signal-to-noise ratio is atrocious. But I too have that impression about the Mayor. I get the feeling that he's at least doing something with the city: the 500 block of lackawanna project alone removed a huge piece of blight in our downtown. I don't really know what the Mayor can do to get us out of distressed city status or fix its other financial problems. Scranton is a dying city that's losing population every single year. At least the Mayor is doing something.
Thanks Commish. And for those on this discussion who are complaining about the 500 project, people are renting there. I happen to know some of them.
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Old 05-06-2009, 07:54 PM
 
Location: Sheeptown, USA
3,236 posts, read 6,628,520 times
Reputation: 907
Quote:
Originally Posted by shoegal111 View Post
There are lots of for sale signs for major two reasons: 1. the bank meltdown that led to the current recession and 2. properties being disposed of as part of an estate. As for no business wants to go downtown because of the taxes, I think Nada & Co., Lush, Kildare's seem to have no problem with it.

Also, if you have only lived here for 7 years then how would you know just how bad things were before the Dougherty administration since he has only been mayor for 7 years. South Side was a mess with crime long before Mayor Dougherty. That's been going on for about 20 years.

Also, crime rates do increase during recessions. Again, its not something specific to what the mayor is or is not doing and transplants from NJ, NY, Philly, etc. would tell you that this is a pretty safe place to live because of the low crime rate even now.

I am not seeing Scranton through rose colored glasses. I do believe some people in this town are fearful of change so they keep blinders on that prevents them from seeing what is really going on around them. It's easier to fight change than to embrace it. In the process of resisting/railing against, people just make themselves and those around them miserable.
I did visit the city before I lived here. The difference between then and now is not all that startling. You're right, South Side was a mess then and parts of it have gotten worse under Doherty's watch.

Those places that you mentioned probably won't last long after the novelty wears off. And his name is Doherty, not Dougherty.
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Old 05-06-2009, 08:13 PM
 
6 posts, read 9,626 times
Reputation: 18
This is quite amusing. Everyone in Scranton has alway complained that nothing ever happens, and nothing ever will. Now something is happening, and its ridiculed. Conspiracy theories are thrown around, complaints about the cost of the rent, and anything else you can think of...One common theme is apparent. People here just want something to complain about...
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Old 05-06-2009, 08:45 PM
 
Location: Marshall-Shadeland, Pittsburgh, PA
32,606 posts, read 77,274,241 times
Reputation: 19071
Do you realize that Wilkes-Barre's murder count and rate so far this year are HIGHER than major cities like Minneapolis, and yet the residents of that city don't air so many sour grapes about "out-of-control" crime the way people in Scranton, where there has only been ONE homicide thus far this year, do? Go Phillies claims that it's because the majority of the people in Wilkes-Barre are low-lives or transplants who don't care enough about the city to complain on its behalf, but as we've seen on this forum alone there are plenty of people in Wilkes-Barre who have positive outlooks---Karnak, W-B Proud, Chefkey, MovingOutOfNJ, Magritte25, etc., etc. (and 3 out of 5 of them ARE transplants). I can't name one Scrantonian on this forum that pumps up their city's image in the same fashion that these five do with their abundant civic pride. It's one thing to "hate da mayor." It's another thing entirely to blind yourself to anything positive about your city just to spite him. I've always felt much more threatened personally walking around Downtown Wilkes-Barre as opposed to walking around Downtown Scranton, and yet people still complain week after week that Scranton's crime is "far out of control." How so? How many random violent crimes have occurred in Scranton so far in 2009? Show me the statistics (I don't consider a husband smacking his wife around to be reason for ME personally to discredit the city as being unsafe).

I don't personally like how Mayor Doherty steals the credit for some projects in which he had a very limited role, if any, in securing for Scranton's benefit (the medical college comes to mind). However, does that mean I hope the medical school fails just to make the mayor look stupid? No. I remember people on DohertyDeceit practically taking bets with jokes about which downtown small business venture would go belly-up next; instead of patronizing their city merchants to help keep them afloat they just laughed at their distress. I don't like how Mayor Doherty gave a WNEP interview (probably back in 2007) in which he said, more or less "People have to realize that I'm the mayor, and I'm the one that makes the decisions!" (Reminding me of an only child whining that he'd have to share something with a new baby sister). I don't like how Mayor Doherty has admitted that he worships Dr. Florida's model of urban renewal in courting the "creative class" because considering most people in Scranton don't have educational attainment levels high enough to label them as white-collar there will NOT be enough of this "creative class" to sustain Downtown Scranton. I don't like the fact that my car CRIES every time I whack a huge pothole along Jefferson Avenue, a gateway through the heart of the city, while the streets in the mayor's affluent neighborhood in Green Ridge are paved in pork. For as many faults as I find with the mayor though I think it's sheer IDIOCY to blend your disdain for the mayor with losing all hope for the future of the city---"gloom" and "doom" scenarios aren't going to attract many new residents to us; they'll instead all flock to South Abington Twp., Roaring Brook Twp., Newton Twp., Pittston Twp., Glenmaura, etc. as they have been for years now.
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Old 05-06-2009, 08:45 PM
 
947 posts, read 1,635,843 times
Reputation: 415
Quote:
Originally Posted by NYRangers 2008 View Post
I did visit the city before I lived here. The difference between then and now is not all that startling. You're right, South Side was a mess then and parts of it have gotten worse under Doherty's watch.

Those places that you mentioned probably won't last long after the novelty wears off. And his name is Doherty, not Dougherty.

Sorry, I guess I would have spelled his name correctly if I was one of his cronies.
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