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LEDC “Economic Injury” Lie Blasted Further Out Of The Water With Latest Sales Tax Numbers

Ouch. I was thinking that maybe Mandy and the LEDC were holding off on their grant application hoping the sales tax numbers for June would be a disaster and MAYBE show a teeny tiny bit of “economic injury” from Covid so they could go and beg for money from the U.S. Treasury.

Not gonna happen.

Sales tax numbers for JUNE sales were reported in the Radiogram today. Texas as a state saw a modest increase over June of 2019 – about 3.6%.

But Lampasas saw a TWENTY-FOUR PERCENT BOOST. That’s 24%, folks. As in, an extra $50,000 or so just for the month.

Recall that the MAY increase was 27% – and another extra $50,000.

So, just in the last two months alone, the City has seen a roughly $100,000 INCREASE in sales tax revenue over the comparable period last year. Yet the parasitic worms at the LEDC are crying poor and want to grab cash from the U.S. Treasury. They’re like an old lady with a ham under one arm crying that she has no bread – to quote Junior Soprano.

Kinda puts a big dent in their claim that the City is facing “economic injury” and thus need the Feds to bail out their shitty ‘Business Park’ debacle on which they have been torching tax dollars for the last 17 years.

To quote the Dispatch from July 17, 2020:

Lampasas notched its largest one-month gain in almost nine years. July payments are based on sales made in May by businesses that report their tax monthly.

With a July check for $193,607, the city of Lampasas had a 27% revenue increase over the comparable period last year. Its year-to-date total now stands at $1.2 million – up 11% for 2020 thus far.

So back in July, the City was up a whopping 11% YoY (that means year-over-year for morons like Bruce Haywood). Throw in these latest numbers and it will climb further for 2020.

All of this tells me that the imbeciles in D.C and at the Federal Reserve printed WAY TOO MUCH FIAT CURRENCY (close to $7 TRILLION SO FAR) and threw it around willy-nilly. Nobody cares NOW, but when the price of everything goes through the roof the next few years, make sure you blame the shit birds in DC and the Fed….and not “evil corporations”.

So – I guess the question now is: how in the HELL is Mandy Walsh, the LEDC and City council going to convince ANYBODY that the City is suffering “economic injury” in light of these numbers?? Lie more? Lie bigger?

Stay tuned…

Wading Through Mandy Walsh’s Hip-Deep Horse Shit – PART III

Our final piece on the LEDC ‘business park’ boondoggle/money grab. To continue dissecting the Dispatch puff-piece:

“Currently, the city does not own land that could host a large primary employer”

This statement confuses the hell out of me. My first response is “so what?” – why does the City need to own all the land first before it’s sold to any business? We already have real estate agents to facilitate transfer of property from, say, the rancher to the Big Box Store.

Secondly, what the hell do you call the 165-acre albatross around your neck that IS the business park?? Are you picking nits and saying the CITY doesn’t own it, the LEDC does? Again – so what? No idea what this babbling nonsense means here. Neither the City NOR the LEDC should be in the business of land speculation and/or development, because those organizations are completely populated by dunces.

In the grand finale, Finley “Spinley” DeGraffenreid has to parrot the exact same bullshit he has been saying for at LEAST 7 years. Blah, blah, blah…dividends for the local economy. Where have I heard his bullshit before? Oh yes…the LAST time the City begged for a million bucks to “develop” the park and “make it shovel ready” back in 2014. Here are a couple of Finley quotes from the past:

“We’re at a point now that we have to make that property marketable, otherwise it won’t be developed,” – Finley in August 2020 (last week)

The LEDC was “proactive,” deGraffenried said, in acquiring the U.S. 183 property several years ago for a business park. The goal of utility extensions, the city manager said, is to develop the land into a site that can promote economic growth. – June 17, 2014 (WHOOPS!)

“DeGraffenried said the LEDC was bold in its decisions to purchase the business park property and extend utilities to it. The city manager predicted Lampasas will enjoy many “spin-off benefits” throughout the city because of the utility work. ” – Oct 23, 2015 (OOPSIE! Wrong again!)

So it was developed with a million bucks back in 2014 but apparently still isn’t developed and isn’t marketable.

Wait a sec…the land it not marketable? Hold on here. I remember the LEDC spending boat loads of money to market it with videos, pamphlets, brochures, etc. Hold on a minute. Let me check my notes….

Ah yes – here are some expenditures made to “market” the corpse repository ‘business park’ YEARS AGO…so I guess it actually WAS marketable at one point?

Neon Cloud Productions (promotion video of weed patch) – $3,354.86

Zoom Advertising – logos, magazine ad (LOL!), art work, banner art, business cards (yes, all for a ‘Business Park’ that does STILL not exist 6.5 years later) – $2,190

Only Finley and his gang of dipshits would spend $5,500 marketing land that they now claim can’t be marketed.

I guess the business park is like Schrödinger’s cat: it is both developed and undeveloped at the same time. It is also marketable yet unmarketable. It exists in two quantum states?

We end the Dispatch article with the usual coup de grace of bullshit – the “artists rendition” of the business park.

Bullshit pipe dream

The REALITY is the photo I took myself below:

Reality where corpses are dumped

Shovel ready since Q4 2015!! LOL!

Wading Through Mandy Walsh’s Hip-Deep Horse Shit – PART II

We already covered the first part of the Dispatch article. Let’s continue….

I think I pretty well already destroyed the ‘economic injury’ claim in the first red box highlighted above. There WAS NO ‘ECONOMIC INJURY’ to Lampasas. Quite the opposite. You can re-read the entire argument HERE.

Notice how by calling this a ‘disaster’ Mandy and the LEDC (and City council) are able to grab a MUCH HIGHER chunk of money they don’t deserve. They can steal 80% of the funding instead of just 50%.

I’m not going to argue that the ‘business park’ isn’t a disaster. It totally is. But it is a disaster 17 years in the making – NOT a disaster because of Covid-19. The LEDC, Mandy Walsh and every single member of City council are acting like scum bag liberals by “never letting a crisis go to waste”.

Every community has been impacted by Covid19? Probably true. Have they all been NEGATIVELY impacted and should be handed almost $1 million to waste on a project that is a 17-year-old, multi-million dollar failure ALREADY? No – that is a lie. Lampasas has come out ahead in all this so far, as I have shown repeatedly. The City is ALREADY getting free stuff to cover all their expenses for things like Plexiglas at City Hall, etc. That is a SEPARATE GRANT – so we are ALREADY getting money for that stuff.

‘She hopes the application will be completed in a month or two‘? That’s funny. BEFORE, it was going to be done by July 31st. I have very little doubt in my mind that it’s already been completed. So WHY would Mandy and the LEDC wait one minute longer than necessary to try and grab free stuff? I have my suspicions but I don’t want to lead them down any paths they haven’t thought to take themselves. I’ll reveal that thought after the grant is actually submitted.

“Walsh said the park would accommodate local businesses’ expansion, as well as attract new businesses to Lampasas. We have businesses here that are ready to grow, they’re ready to add more employees and expand their business,” she said. “If we had space for them, we would see a lot of our current businesses thrive.”

This is just a colossal pile of nonsense. As if the poor, dumb business owners in our town just HAVE TO HAVE Mandy and the LEDC hold their hand and gift them some land so they can expand. They are just BURSTING AT THE SEAMS but are too stupid to realize they can go out and buy land on their own from a private citizen who is selling. Only Mandy Walsh and her clip board can save the day! The same Mandy Walsh who has never run a business in her life.

OK. If you say so.

I’m wondering how Wal-Mart ever got built in our town without Mandy and the LEDC to hand them free stuff. Or Putter & Gutters. Or Bill’s Burgers. Or that building that Lotus Spa now occupies. How they hell did they even START in business without the geniuses at the LEDC to guide them and hand them “City” land?

I ask AGAIN: WHAT ARE THE NAMES OF THESE BUSINESSES that are so “ready to grow” and “add more employees”? Once again -MANDY NEVER NAMES A SINGLE BUSINESS. She can’t. If she did, it would be too easy for me to go digging and asking questions and her bullshit narrative would collapse.

Part III coming up…..

Wading Through Mandy Walsh’s Hip-Deep Horse Shit – PART I

As promised, I want to go through the latest Dispatch puff-piece about the Lampasas Economic Dunces Club (LEDC) ‘business park’ and their attempt to fleece the United States Federal government to fund it further. I have highlighted particularly odious piles of horse shit for further discussion:

Right off the bat, they TWICE repeat the lie that this is “Phase I” of the development. This implies they are JUST NOW starting out on this project. It hides the ACTUAL history of complete failure and money wasting for the last 17 years. I SUSPECT they did this so it looks better on their grant application.

The reality is that they spent close to ONE MILLION DOLLARS back in the 2014/2015 time frame when Chris Toups was mayor. THAT was “Phase I”. It was also supposed to be the ONLY phase of this debacle. The pitch back then (SIX YEARS AGO) was that we just need to throw a million at this ‘goat pasture’ and the high-paying jobs would come pouring in.

Don’t believe me? I went through the Dispatch archives and found every idiotic quote from every idiotic politician and government dingbat and listed them all RIGHT HERE going back to 2014. Go ahead and click the link to have a look. I’ll wait.

You’re back? OK. Let’s continue.

Walsh said “Last fall, an international business expressed interest in opening an operation in the park”.

Notice how Mandy NEVER names names of all these supposed interested parties? What business was it, Mandy? Wait, don’t tell me. I already know. It’s “Eco-Strong LLC” which was not even formed a year ago? You have met with Mike Cour several times – starting last fall. About ONE MONTH after this “Eco-Strong LLC” was incorporated, according to Texas filings.

It is SUPPOSEDLY a distribution arm of “Eco-Flex”, which is a Canadian company. Eco-Strong LLC appears to be a one-man operation…SUPPOSEDLY somehow related to Eco-FLEX but with a different name(?).

A British website called “Tyre & Rubber Recycling” ran a huge (obviously bullshit) story back in May of this year describing how ground was JUST ABOUT to be broken in Lampasas on a tire recycling plant in early June. I emailed the author (Ewan Scott) the DAY AFTER his highly erroneous article was published. No answer! How odd. I feel it highly unlikely Ewan Scott would just make this crap up out of thin air. He must have had someone feeding him “information”, right?

So, did Mike Cour feed Ewan Scott this line of shit to make his “company” look more legit when he went to the LEDC? What exactly was his “presentation” to the LEDC?

We can never know, because the LEDC does their best to keep everyone in the dark about these back-room deals: The LEDC skips meetings constantly (they skipped TWO of SEVEN meetings already this year)…..they move meeting times to noon to make it inconvenient for working stiffs to attend…they REFUSE to record their meetings on the City’s $96,000 A/V system, despite them holding their meetings in the exact same building as City council (the $1.5 million dollar Fishbowl).

But let’s get back to the article!

“Walsh said most businesses are unable to wait for the city to prepare sites in the park”

Again I ask you Mandy: WHAT BUSINESSES! Please, name ONE single business that is just chomping at the bit to break ground tomorrow. Just name ONE.

You can’t. Because it is just more bullshit. Bullshit you pile upon bullshit to make this corpse repository appear to be a viable project when it is anything but.

Part II coming soon…..

Business Park Grant Application Resolution Contains Giant Lie

The Dispatch published a giant puff-piece (which I will pick apart in my next post) on the LEDC “business park” and their current attempt to grab federal tax dollars they are NOT (in my opinion) entitled to. It is a welfare queen move and a complete scumbag move. It is no different than scumbag liberal politicians in California or Chicago begging for federal taxes to balance their budgets. Budgets that were ruined FAR before Wuhan Flu came onto the scene.

According to the Dispatch articls:

Projects that respond to “ECONOMIC INJURY as a result of coronavirus”

Funny – it sure doesn’t seem like the City has suffered any “economic injury” to me. Quite the opposite, in fact. They are sitting on a pile of money, according to City Manager Finley DeGraffenreid (who is paid $140,000 per year + roughly $30,000 in benefits):

Things are so good, in fact, Finley recommends giving the entire City workforce an across-the-board 3% raise IN ADDITION to another $40,000 in “salary adjustments” [see page 13 under “recommendations”].

Finley himself even got a $10,000 raise back in mid-May – right as the “pandemic” was supposedly raging and roughly 40 million Americans were being thrown out of work.

Furthermore, the City’s sales tax receipts have also shot upward – the complete OPPOSITE of the rest of the state of Texas.

For the month of March, the entire state of Texas sales tax revenue was DOWN approximately 5% but the City of Lampasas sales tax receipts were UP 11%!!!

For the month of April (the lock down month), Texas sales tax receipts were DOWN 12% BUT LAMPASAS SAW A NINE PERCENT INCREASE! Yes – a 9% increase year-over-year.

For the month of May (the partial re-opening month) the state of Texas as a whole saw sales tax receipts DOWN either 2.6% or 6.5% depending on which source you believe. But City of Lampasas tax receipts were UP AN ASTOUNDING 26%!!!

Yes, you read that correctly. UP TWENTY-SIX PERCENT!!!

** NEW INFO ** – For the Month of June, the state of Texas as a whole saw a 3.6% increase in sales tax receipts year-over-year – but Lampasas saw another MASSIVE JUMP AGAIN of 24%.

All these facts didn’t stop City council from lying through their teeth like scumbag welfare queens with their “Resolution Authorizing Application” for this grant – which will be made through Langford Community Management Services. You can find the entire resolution in the City council packets HERE on Page 44.

It partially reads:

“WHEREAS the ‘Applicant’ has determined that the economic activity generated from this project will positively impact the City economy, overall, which has been adversely affected by the COVID19 disaster;

City council then UNANIMOUSLY voted to approve this resolution. You can hear it HERE at the 25 minute mark.

No discussion. No questions. No comments. ALL SEVEN GOLDFISH agreed to this lie and think NOTHING of using that lie to grab federal tax dollars from innocent taxpayers in Kansas, Florida and every other state. Taxpayers who are now being forced to hand over their hard-earned money to fund the frantic fuck-up (pardon my French) that is the LEDC Business Park.

Just The Goldfish being goldfish, I guess. They have already forgotten (as Goldfish are wont to do) the 26% boom in sales tax, the $1.7 million budget surplus AND the boom in residential construction as Big City clowns rush to small towns like Lampasas to escape failed libtard policies, crime and mask police.

Furthermore, the ‘business park’ is hardly a project that “RESPONDS to economic injury’. How could it be a “response to Coronavirus injury” when it has been in existence for OVER A DECADE and Covid just appeared 7 months ago? It can’t be. So that’s yet another lie.

I’m no lawyer, but it seems to me that LYING to grab money from the government might be construed as fraud. Right Jo-Christy Brown? Not much different than disability fraud or welfare fraud, it seems to me.

I promised you all I would do everything I could to stop this theft. Remember?

Well, I will be sending ALL of this information to whomever reviews these grants at the federal level. Along with my opinion that this is outright fraud – since the City and the LEDC cannot (with a straight face) claim that the City of Lampasas was impacted negatively AT ALL by the Wuhan Flu.

Every one of you who nonchalantly voted for this lie is now officially a welfare queen and political scumbag. You are no better than a worm-like Chicago or Baltimore political parasite. It’s absolutely disgusting.

But…But…But…The Nurses Wear Masks!

“But nurses have always worn masks all day.”

No! SOME wear them, for short stints.

Remember when nurses in Canada fought for the right NOT to wear masks, and an arbitrator heard testimony and sided with them, concluding masks were useless and the requirement unreasonable? True story.

It was waaaay back in 2015.

I know how much you lefty dummies LOVE the Canadian healthcare model. So you’ll be all over this, too….right?

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Branch Covidians Fail At Math

I knew the average American was completely inept at basic math, but this REALLY takes the cake. I find it unsurprising that idiot liberals (who traffic in emotion and fail at math) are falling for this mask nonsense the hardest of all.

New poll shows Americans think 9% of people have died of COVID19, that is MORE THAN 200 TIMES THE ACTUAL NUMBER!!!!

Of course, 9% of America would be about 30 million people dead. How stupid can you be? It boggles the mind.

I also read a story about a guy talking to his buddy in Oregon (liberal haven). The Oregon resident insisted that 80,000 Oregonians have died of Wuhan Flu. The actual number is more like 400.

We are literally living in a society where morons cannot process the difference between 400 and 80,000. Unfortunately, the morons are loud and in charge. Any attempt to refute their stupidity with actual facts is shouted down as you are called a “grandma killer”.

These people need to be slapped in the head until they are knocked back into reality. I see no other way to resolve this.

Also, any assholes throwing hot coffee or spraying mace into the faces of the maskless should be beaten until they are a pulp on the ground.

People wonder why I detest liberals with every bone in my body. THIS is why. They yammer about Trump being a “facist” but THEY are the ones who will be loading people into train cars for not bowing to their moronic demands.

City Flush With Cash – Will Still Beg For Federal Money To Fund ‘Business Park’

Everything is coming up roses for the City of Lampasas! Between saving roughly $80,000 by not opening a public pool, people being forced to stay home due to Wuhan Flu and run up City electric bills, and the idiots in Washington DC handing out trillions of dollars, the City is sitting on a nice surplus!

And you know what we do with surpluses, right? Dream up a million ways to squander it, that’s what!

Sales tax collections were up TWENTY-SIX PERCENT for the month of May compared to May of 2019. That’s an extra $50k or so in the City’s pockets just right there. How is that possible?? Well, the federal government handed just about everyone $1200…PLUS another $500 for each kid…PLUS all the people being paid and extra $600 in unemployment to sit home and watch TV. Add all that up, and there was likely an injection of about $4 million into the local economy. People were SO close to starvation and destitution that they went right out and spent it on tattoos, new dogs, iPhones and other unnecessary shit.

Presto – the City gets an extra $50k in sales tax receipts!

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it is another $3 trillion piled on the federal debt, but who cares about that?? Right Bruce? Just print up another few trillion and give everyone a free lunch! Yay! Just remember that when your grocery bill goes up 30% next year. Of course, the SMART people know how printing trillions in paper currency always ends. But I digress.

The City immediatley made some “accelerated purchases” – some sweet 2020 trucks. A City drowning in cash doesn’t bother looking for deals on 2017 models! Hell no! Every City employee is already scheming about how to get “their share” of the windfall, no doubt.

So riddle me this: if the City is sitting on a huge pile of unexpected cash, why are they going to go beg the Federal government for close to a million dollars to fund their corpse repository ‘business park’??

You remember the ‘business park’, right?

Could it be that everyone on City council, the LEDC and City Hall actually DOES know that the ‘business park’ is a giant piece of dogshit and colossal waste of money? Methinks that might be the case.

After all, if pissing away over $4 million on the corpse repository is SUCH a fantastic idea and SUCH a good use of tax dollars, the City would be falling all over themselves to fund it with “their” money.

But they aren’t.

They’d rather go hat-in-hand to taxpayers all over the United States with their bullshit story about “covid” and steal a pile of cash from hardworking truck drivers in Oklahoma and waitresses in Mighigan, right?

Disgusting. What a bunch of welfare queens.