Todd Zinser - Bridges, Roundabouts, and Gentrification OHMY!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
If you have KRCD talk station. A very very happy Wednesday,
made extra special because Todd Zenser is back in studio.
Former Inspector General of the US Department of Commerce. He
has an amazing background crunching numbers and finding out facts,
and he's still at it in his free time. In
his spare time, he follows things political as well as well.

(00:25):
I suppose from a financial bottom line standpoint. We were
just joking around and we're going to talk about the
Brent Spence Bridge project, and I just I just kind
of looked at him and I said, do you think
this project will ever get off the ground? And he
just chuckled. He said, yeah, eventually. Welcome back, Todd Zenzer.
The problem seems to be is that we do have

(00:48):
a necessary project, which is replacing the Brent Spence Bridge.
It's over capacity, it's falling apart, it's it's way way
more traffic on it than it was ever built to handle.
So fine, we can at least all Republican Democrat independent
communists agree that, you know, we need a Bran Spence Bridge,
and maybe a few people out there going no, we don't.

(01:09):
But this has turned into one of those well if
you're going to build a bridge then, and everybody and
his brother wants to get their hand in the cookie
jar and start changing it and adding it and putting
the adding on this and that and so the latest
and let's just start with the bridge. Roundabouts roundabouts and
then they don't look like roundabouts in the traditional roundabout sense.

(01:30):
They had a caller earlier. They didn't like them, and
I think primarily the normal roundabout, Like we joke when
we think you're European vacation with Chevy Chase, you pull
up to it and when you have a space, you
pull onto the roundabout. You continue to move until you
get to the street you want to go on and
pull off. It's a circle. He it's the name round about.
The plans that I saw reported by at least over

(01:52):
a CPO. These don't look like that. They just look
like streets.

Speaker 2 (01:57):
Well, it's a little hard to figure out. But morning Brian.
By the way, it's a little difficult to figure out
exactly what they have in mind because the headline in
the Enquirer article talked about twenty roundabouts. Yeah, and there aren't.
There probably aren't ten roundabouts in the whole metropolitan area

(02:18):
at this point. I go through one most mornings over
in Newport across the south Gate Bridge because four seventy
one is closed, so an alternate as a south Gate
bridge when you go over there by the aquarium. I
know you're talking about it around about absolutely, it's very simple.

Speaker 1 (02:32):
They are once you get used to them, they're simple.
I mean, some people struggle with the concept, and you know,
some people will just merge right on in rather than
waiting for the opportunity. But once we all sort that
out to get used to it, I think most people
like me will find them to be a far better
thing than sitting at a red light, idling and waiting
for the damn thing to turn green, because that doesn't

(02:53):
help anybody.

Speaker 2 (02:54):
What your caller earlier today is kind of a representative
of what people think about roundabouts. They don't like them.
They're they're not used to them. They don't really understand
how to maneuver through them. Uh so you know that's.

Speaker 1 (03:10):
A valid that's a valid curve.

Speaker 2 (03:12):
Yeah. So the other thing about roundabouts that hasn't been
talked about is they're not really pedestrian or bicycle friendly.
Oh oh, all right, which seems contradictory to the latest
push to walkable cities and things like that.

Speaker 1 (03:30):
It's so funny you brought that up, because that kind
of thing never enters my mind. One, I don't ride
a bike, and wherever I kind of round about, there's
no way I would ever be on foot to be
in a place where the roundabout is. It's just that's off,
that's been off my radar. But that's actually funny.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
Yeah, it's uh, it's something they have to consider. Plus,
roundabouts take up a lot of land.

Speaker 1 (03:53):
Yeah, well they do that.

Speaker 2 (03:54):
Yes, and if if they've got I think the number
I saw for this Queensgate concept is twenty five acres
that they've reclaimed or something like that. You put twenty
roundabouts in twenty five acres, you're not going to have
much much else left. So I thought, I don't think
we're looking at twelve. I think you're probably maybe looking

(04:15):
at the four corners or something like that to get
into the queens Gate area.

Speaker 1 (04:20):
Well, I will say that in certain places, under certain
traffic conditions, I think they are a good idea, But
a roundabout for the sake of putting it around about
is a stupid idea.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
Yeah, you don't know whether they've thought all that through.
I'm sure they must have no.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
And I joked about this morning too because I saw
city council examining New Brunsman's Bridge approach using roundabouts, and
I was struggling with the idea of our city council
all the way up to the mayor having any concept
about planning. And I know they have people hired out
to do planning, but therein lies the challenge because those

(04:57):
people they hire out to do these and consider these
projects are the type of people that bring up other
ideas and additions that raise the price and the cost
of these things to astronomical numbers. And they already start
with astronomical numbers.

Speaker 2 (05:11):
That's right. So right now it looks like there's excuse me,
one point six billion federal dollars that are committed to
the project. But the project right now is estimated to
cost three points six billions. So that's another two billion
dollars on top of what the bridge money from the
federal government totals.

Speaker 1 (05:32):
Well, the bridge, if we just focus excuse me, if
we just focus on the bridge, the necessary component, and
ignore roundabouts and extensions over and whatever, is that the
three is that where that three billion dollar figure comes from.

Speaker 2 (05:50):
It comes from the whole footprint. They've got the bridge
and then there's maybe three four or five miles on
the Kentucky side and three miles on the Cincinnati side.
We'll go up to Western Hills Vidoc. Yeah, and then
they'll go up to Fort Fort Mitchell and so there's
various access entrances and excess and all the rest of that.

(06:13):
So the issue with Queensgate looks to be the connections
to seventy five. Once that work is completed, how is
it going to connect? What are the connections going to
be in Ohio DOT which is controlling the Ohio side issue,

(06:35):
they came up with access to Queen's Gate. It's called it. Well,
actually this this Brian Bowling came up with this idea
of this grid over seventy five into Queensgate, and ODOT
cooperated and came up with a design. And Brian didn't
like that design, and I guess city council didn't like
that design.

Speaker 1 (06:56):
Either way, you'll make Brian thing, I'm sorry who made this?
This This Brian guy pope of the whole I think.

Speaker 2 (07:04):
He made himself a pope. I mean, he came up
with these proposals.

Speaker 1 (07:07):
Oh who is he? He is a.

Speaker 2 (07:12):
He's a local activist at this point, but he's he
started a group called Bridge Forward.

Speaker 1 (07:16):
Oh, he was on my program, was at earlier this year.

Speaker 2 (07:19):
Last year or something.

Speaker 1 (07:20):
And he's the one that wanted to cover all of
it with this, with the surface covering, so you could
sort of build on top of and above the roads
below right, which you know, I don't know where the
nine bajillion dollars would come to be able to afford
to pay. That looks good on paper, nice theoretical concept,
but we are pretty much broke as a city.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, that's the that's the missing That's the missing piece,
Brian is how much is all that going to cost?
And I think that's what resulted in him pairing down
all of these proposals to where now the differences between
one way streets going in and out of Queen's Gate
to two way streets going in and out of Queen's
Gate plus plus the roundabouts. That's I think that's where

(08:03):
the conversation is right now.

Speaker 1 (08:04):
Okay, well, it's possible we have a number of topics
or whoever with Todd, we clearly have not left this
concert or this talk yet, So we'll talk a little
bit more about the brun spens Bridge project. Todd Zinzer
in studio if we got it for an hour until
we get the judge in the poltono and you're going
to crack up with the judge's column today. Shoot the drones,
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Speaker 1 (10:48):
Seven fifty five KC Detalk Station, A very happy Wednesday.
I th you're talking with Todd Zenzer, a brilliant man.
He is in so many matters. But we're talking about
the Renspns Bridge, and we were talking about the origins
of this this project. Okay, we all agree the Brent
Spnce prizies we replaced. Now they're trying to add on
and part of the additions involve additional road work to
connect the west and with I guess the rest of

(11:13):
the city. And there are a lot of activists behind this.
You know, they say it was racism to build the
expressway in the first place, because it destroyed you know,
quote unquote affordable housing for many a lot of black
people live there. I mean, we all have to acknowledge
our history here. And even if it was that act
of racism that destroyed that neighborhood, they needed to build

(11:35):
the damn expressway. I don't know where else I seventy
five would go if it isn't where it is now,
because you had the railroads right there, and of course
you couldn't move it over to the east because that's
where the city is literally sitting. You knock down the
crew tower back then, and so you can put ICE
seventy five right through it. So that wasn't even within
the realm of feasibility. But if you're going to redress

(11:58):
that wrong, if we want to call it that by
rebuilding this neighborhood, FC Cincinnati clearly had that in mind.
Why else would they choose that neighborhood. You know, look,
we got plenty of opportunity here. We build this, We're
gonna have bars, we're gonna have restaurants, and we're gonna
bring in housing. This sounds remarkably like what happened in
Over the Rhine Now, I remember the early eighties when

(12:18):
I worked in Over the Rhine. It has transformed dramatically,
but also at the expense of getting rid of affordable housing.
I mean, it's expensive for young urban hipsters to rent
a condo by a condo or rent properties there, and
that's one of the things that angered many of the residents.
Regentrification comes at a high cost, and it ends up

(12:41):
moving out people who used to call that an affordable neighborhood.
So isn't that exactly what's going to happen here if
we move forward with this. I'm not trying to negate
the positives from the development. I'm not trying to say
we need to choke off or keep that west end
closed off and unusable. But it comes with the same
sort of set of issues that Over the Rhine came

(13:02):
with and comes with and will exist now. And haven't
there been local activists who've been making the point that
I'm making right now about this.

Speaker 2 (13:10):
Yeah, the idea of taking neighborhoods and gentrifying them results
in the residents being displaced placed. And if you go
back to connective communities, you have three members of city
council who voted against it, and that was their main
concern is that the rezoning is going to displace people,

(13:33):
It's going to bring in developers, who's going to put
who are going to build housing that really aren't affordable,
or people are going to be displaced, and the same
thing goes. I mean, that is one of the biggest
issues in the City of Cincinnati is how do we
develop the city and take care that we don't displace
people well.

Speaker 1 (13:51):
And add on to that, and I don't want to
devolve too much, but I know the city has a
lot of mandates and edicts with regard to how home
are constructed. You know, you can or cannot have a
parking space, or it must be built to certain energy
efficiency standards. That kind of thing really significantly jacks the
price up of any construction project.

Speaker 2 (14:13):
Yes, yes it does. And the idea that the city
is struggling with this housing issue, I mean, I guess
all cities do that, but the latest, for example, is
a proposal from Mark Jeffries. He wants the city to
use lots that it owns, vacant lots that it owns,

(14:35):
and experiment with new modular homes for low income or
affordable housing, like shipping container size homes. I don't know
how big they are. All it said in the description
was a modular which means you just come in and
snap them together. But yeah, it's a struggle. It's a

(14:56):
constant struggle about how to provide affordable housing to people
and grow the city at the same time.

Speaker 1 (15:02):
Well, as we stare over the landscape, I saw an
article globally speaking, housing is expensive. This isn't just the
United States problem. It's just in a downtown. Since any problem,
the cost of real estate has gone through the roof.
And I think that's one of the reasons why I
guess there's this push for these fifteen minute cities. They
want everybody to live in a tiny micro space or

(15:24):
mini house and take their bike to work or ride
the public transportation system, which is another topic where I
have to get to. It's the streetcar, because it's see
the streetcar extension mentioned in connection with the reconfiguration of
the brans Ben's Bridge project. Well, very high level, difficult
to solve problems that Todd and I are working on
this morning. Maybe we'll solve them before the judgement of

(15:46):
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Speaker 1 (18:11):
Seven fifteen, think about KRCD talk station Brian Thomas with
Todd Zinzer and studio talking complex issues, trying to put
pen to paper and figure out what this brent S
Benz Project's going to be like. And the more everybody
in electric capacity talks about it, the more things get
suggested added or opportunities to do some additional development. I

(18:33):
learned a new concept over the break, and we're going
to talk right now, real quickly about sacrificial slabs. I
was thinking immediately sacrificial lambs, No sacrificial slab, Todd, you
want to let my listeners know exactly what this is
all about.

Speaker 2 (18:49):
Yeah, So the article in the Enquirer about all this
talked about sacrificial slabs so that the infrastructure be able
to accommodate a streetcar expansion. And I don't think they
really mean sacrificial slabs. Sacrificial slabs are like roadways that

(19:11):
are paved in a certain way that when you need
to repave them, it's easier, So the slab that's down
there can be easily taken up and resurfaced. Oh that's
my understanding of sacrificial slabs. I think what they're talking
about is something called future proofing or intermodal design, where

(19:34):
they take a piece of infrastructure and they design it
for more than one purpose, or for a future purpose. So,
for example, I don't know what the overpasses into Queensgate
that are being proposed. I don't know how they would
have to be constructed or in what different way they
would have to be constructed in order for the streetcar

(19:55):
to be able to go over those overpasses in the future.
That ever, that ever, managing the weight, for example, yeah,
or yeah, the weight and the width of the overpass.
How much room does the streetcar need to maneuver those
types of things?

Speaker 1 (20:12):
Okay, okay, so from a weight standpoint, I would think
that if it can handle a long line of loaded
semi tractor trailers, it could certainly manage a mostly empty streetcar.

Speaker 2 (20:23):
You would think, ye.

Speaker 1 (20:24):
Yeah. So the question is maybe how why the road
is because of course, going back to your bike, we
have to have a bike path, right, so you got
to have that and pedestrian walking paths. So there's a
little extra with right there. And then on top of that,
maybe enough additional space you could run some railroad track
on it, even though they didn't have to do that
for the streetcar downtown Cincinnati. They just put the track

(20:46):
on the road and the cars navigate around or behind
or with the streetcar, which seems logical and reasonable.

Speaker 2 (20:52):
Right, So these overpasses will be new. So the idea
of these planners is to make sure that you know,
we're prepared to extend the streetcar if we ever, if
we ever get that far. The problem I have with
that is paying for it. Well, if you look at
any of this, Brian, the only numbers that have been
published is that the original plan for Queen's Gate or

(21:16):
for this additional planning, would be like one hundred million dollars. Now,
when a three point six billion dollar project that doesn't much,
That doesn't seem like much, But that money is going
to have to come from another source other than the
money that's already devoted to the project.

Speaker 1 (21:34):
I mean, we'll get the Brown family to pay for it,
since we built them the stadium.

Speaker 2 (21:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (21:39):
So oh, Joe suggested railroad money. But see, Joe, that's
for existing infrastructure, and I'm still waiting for them to
pave to pay Sunset my favorite illustration of a neglected
road that will literally throw your car out of alignment
the moment you drive on it any number of feet. Hold,
no one cares about price Hill Joe says, he's probably right.

(22:01):
He is right.

Speaker 2 (22:03):
But now that you bring up the railway, the first
thing that I thought about in terms of the they
called it sacrificial slabbing, or I call it future proofing.
Once you prepare that for the streetcar, does that make
that existing infrastructure? And can we now extend that streetcar? Yes,

(22:24):
over those overpasses because that infrastructure is existing.

Speaker 1 (22:28):
Of course, Because I feel very confident I have not
read the documents. I don't know that I even have
access to them. But the limitations on using railroad that
railroad sale money were for use on existing infrastructure. And
as you point out, anybody can make that argument once
you build it with some other dollars, and you and
I Todd, you more than anyone know. Money is fungible.

(22:51):
So they got a pile of railroad money over here,
they use this pile of money over here, could be
in the same bank account for all I know. But no, no, no, no,
that's not the railroad money. This is our taxpayer dollars
from over here. This is the normal money we spent
on infrastructure, and we're going to use that to build
these future you know, with roads. And then once they're building, like, oh,
there's the railroad money, we can use that because the
road's built, it's existing. That I guarantee. That's the idea. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (23:14):
What's funny is the city Council earlier this month made
a motion where they want the city to study They
want the city administration to study this and get back
to them in sixty days. So back in February, the
City Council passed a motion to get a study on

(23:37):
additional internal controls and safeguards for the railway money. So
I was working with Crammerdine Jeff Grammerdine on that, and
I wanted them to put a deadline in on their
study or on their report, like sixty days. They didn't
do that. So nine months later, does the city council
have a report about how to strengthen the guideline and

(24:00):
the internal controls and the railway money. No, they don't,
but they want this, this plan for the for Queensgate
done in sixty days.

Speaker 1 (24:10):
This is you know, it's also funny on a theoretical
level if you just look like if we were just
talking on completely theoretical bases, this would be downright high comedy.
This is going on right now with real dollars at
stake here and the future of the city at stake here,

(24:33):
And I'm just wondering about the competency level of the
people who are responsible for the decision making, if you
know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (24:39):
Well, what's interesting is that this Bridge Forward group who
is pushing this plan for the for the Queen Skate area,
they're affiliated with the Davoo Foundation. Somehow, I'm not sure
exactly what the what the connection is. But the Davoo
Foundation is the organization that's behind this, is expanding the

(25:01):
street car.

Speaker 1 (25:05):
Hold the thought. We're out of time. In the hour,
I gotta go. I'm gonna get the hairy eyeball from Joe.
We'll continue with Todd Zenzer after the top of the
art news your voice. Thank you for telling macall your country.
It's refreshing.

Speaker 2 (25:17):
Hear it every day.

Speaker 1 (25:18):
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(25:41):
bottom of the hour shoot the drones. Oh it's hilarious. Well,
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Always look forward to that, and I sure hope you
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pull it up on podcast page fifty five kr se
dot com. In the meantime, I continue, are we rather

(26:02):
Todd Zinser and I continue our in studio conversation. We're
going to continue talking about this project, the Brent Spenz
Bridge project. Now, now I did learn that in spite
of my out loud statement that nobody disagrees that the
bridge itself needs to be modernized to the extend it
can handle the additional traffic. It's obviously threefold more than

(26:23):
it was when it was built. It's getting long in
the tooth in terms of its life, and so that's
why the federal government has agreed to expend what do
you say, the allocation was one point one one point
six billion. Now, we were talking about these delays, and
there's been many delays over the years. How the what's
the project going to look like? And then all these
add ons that keep popping up out of nowhere. You

(26:45):
meant in the Future Forward group, and you got mentioned
the duvou Foundation now has got its hand in the
cookie jar with all these additional proposals extensions. Oh we
need to you know, extend it to get over to
the west end, and blah blah blah. The original price
tag for this Brent Spn sprint project was two point
one billion.

Speaker 2 (27:06):
Yes, I think it was even lower than that years earlier,
but well just a couple of years ago it was
two point one.

Speaker 1 (27:12):
So as we move forward with no work done, the
price obviously is increasing. I mean, if you just look
at what the effect COVID supply chain issues and the
cost of labor and inflation has done alone, that's how
we now end up with a three point six billion
dollar project, excuse me, which does not include any of

(27:34):
these additional things that we have been talking about this morning.

Speaker 2 (27:37):
Right the modifications over the west, the Queensgate West in
those types of areas.

Speaker 1 (27:46):
And sacrificial slabs and all these the do dads, the extras,
the stuff and things. And you showed a really bright
right light of reality over the break here that I
think my lists need to hear because their probably a
world in their eyes going, oh my god, this is
going to be insane. How are you going to pay
for this? Well, it may be that all this time

(28:10):
and energy is just really talking about theoretical things, things
that will not happen because the money is not there now,
ignoring the railroad money complexities and whether or not this
is going to become existing infrastructure or not. It isn't
built yet. That's right, So you're not going to extend
the streetcar line on a road if it isn't built,

(28:30):
because there's no money for that either and no will
or desire. But you mentioned that the price tag for
any of this stuff would fall on Frankfurt and Columbus,
the Ohio and Kentucky taxpayers, because the federal government has
already issued its allocation.

Speaker 2 (28:45):
Right, there's a contract now that the governments of Ohio
and Kentucky have signed with the general contractor. This is
a design build, which means they got one outfit, both
designing it and constructing it. The contract have been signed
with that group, so they're not going to tolerate all

(29:05):
a bunch of changes while they're trying to get the bridge.

Speaker 1 (29:08):
Belt fair enough, which means the conversations with these outside
entities are are done more as a matter of courtesy,
because yes, they're not going to happen because the money's
not there.

Speaker 2 (29:20):
That's right. There's the Then what the State of Ohio
and Commonwealth of Kentucky did at some point they told
Bridge Forward that you're going to have to deal with
the contractor. We're going to we're issuing a contract. Any
changes you want, you're going to have to work it
out with the contractor, and that that's what's been going on.

Speaker 1 (29:39):
Okay, And the contractor already knows what finite dollars it's
working with because no one else is coming up with
the additional dollars.

Speaker 2 (29:45):
And there's incentives on the contractor to save money. There's
something called value engineering, which means that they need to
continually look at their processes and their construction to squeeze
out additional savings. They've got all of that in there.

Speaker 1 (30:00):
It's in their advantage to do that anyway, that's right.
So that's where additional profit can come from.

Speaker 2 (30:04):
So what's happening with the Queensgate area is really going
to boil down to a city issue. That's why the
city council now once they study on this whole proposal,
because they're going to wind up paying for it.

Speaker 1 (30:16):
Okay, But the Commonwealth and the state of Ohio are
both And as much as I complain about Columbus, I
can't imagine the Republicans in Columbus or the Republicans in
Frankfurt agreeing to throw additional taxpayer dollar resources at any
of these additional projects. I mean, are you with me

(30:37):
on that? At least in terms of expectation.

Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yes, you look at how long this project has been
coming for yeah, decades, and a lot of it was
because of the lack of funding. So now they've got
the funding they need for the bridge, and you're going
to go back and try to get more after the
State of Ohio and the Commonwealth are putting all of
this money into it already, it's just not practical.

Speaker 1 (31:04):
It's not And the city doesn't own this project.

Speaker 2 (31:08):
Well, they absolutely do not own the bridge project and
the act, the entrances and exits on the Ohio side,
that's still part of the project. The modifications though to
open up Queensgate and to make it more accessible to
people from downtown, that's all the city's.

Speaker 1 (31:28):
Business, right that would be a city project as opposed
to a federal sort of it's a quasi federal state
project right now in terms of replacing the bridge and
dealing with that that space. So has anybody pointed this out,
the ones that continue to talk about all this extra
stuff and things and delays that has the governor of

(31:48):
the state of Ohio or the governor of Kentucky and
I know we got that to deal with, but put
their collective foot down and just said shut up. I mean,
this is what we've already contracted this out.

Speaker 2 (32:00):
Actually, Governor DeWine made some kind of statement about, well,
the people of Cincinnati should decide or something like that.

Speaker 1 (32:08):
Conscious pilots washing his hands. The whole thing is that
it exactly well, he's got constituents they answer for, and
that'll be the taxpayers in every other county in the
state of Ohio.

Speaker 2 (32:18):
Yeah. So the other thing to keep in mind on
this Queen's Gate issue in the streetcar that the future
proofing is what about metro. I mean, they raised our
property taxes, or we agreed to raise our property taxes
so we could have a more robust metro, and rather
than use them going in and out of Queen's Gate,

(32:41):
they want to put a somebody's thinking they're going to
put a streetcar through there. It just it just doesn't
make sense to me.

Speaker 1 (32:48):
It doesn't I don't know how it can make sense
to anybody. I mean, you know, before they built the
damn streetcar, we were all saying, jeez, just look, make
buses look like streetcars. They can go around accidents, they
don't require the meeting. It's in upkeep that a street
car does. They're not permanent fixtures in the ground. There's
a traffic issue. The bus can take a left as
opposed to going straight. You know, I mean it, This

(33:10):
just makes more sense. They're they're they're immediately movable in
terms of the roots they take. Yeah, so all these
things keep coming back up.

Speaker 2 (33:21):
Yes, they do. And the issue with the with the
Metro is that they only have like sixteen million dollars
in operating revenue, but they opt their operating budget is
almost one hundred and thirty million dollars. So the difference
there is your are your property taxes. And the fact

(33:44):
is I think if you look at what they're spending
money on, they've probably got more money than they know
what to do with. In fact, they are. They have
some kind of grant program where they give money to
jurisdictions to do things about Metro. I mean, they've got
so much money now that they have this tax increase,
that they're flush. They have no issues with money whatsoever.

Speaker 1 (34:09):
You're talking about metros Metro, Yes, yes, yeah, Well, and
then I'll go back to the deteriorating nature of the
infrastructure within the City of Cincinnati. Generally speaking, there's a
listener out there that you should call in Fred and
he's like, I just want my damn road fix. You know,
look at they've got potholes all over. I just want
my road fix. That's the constant refrain from the average

(34:31):
person in the city. And my constant complained about I
mean again, sunset my favorite illustration. That road looks like
it's been through either Afghanistan war or it looks like
it's from Syria and they just imported it as is,
and it's looked that way for years. They let everything
fall apart while they chase that for these shiny bright objects,

(34:52):
when I think most taxpayers would be just comfortable with
them keeping and maintaining what we've got already.

Speaker 2 (34:58):
Yeah, I agree with you, Brian, that that should be
the use of the railway money.

Speaker 1 (35:02):
Let's pause from and we'll have one more with with
Todd Zinzer and maybe we can talk about property taxes
a little bit more. I don't know if you saw
what happened the other day in Columbus. They had a
piece of legislation to help maybe deal with this property
tax reality, and well it just doesn't quite do enough.
And I'm thinking, what are you gonna throw out the
decent for the sake of the perfect they had a
chance to do it. It's been laying around for years.

(35:25):
But they're going on vacation, so they're going to start
all over again next year. Hang on one more with Todd
Zender before we get to judge anapollo time. It's eight
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Speaker 2 (36:35):
This is fifty five KRC an iHeartRadio station. I think
at Hunkolenoscopy tests.

Speaker 1 (36:40):
And Brian Thomas with Todd Zenzer, former Inspector General, knows
what he's talking about when it comes to dollars and
cents and managing projects and looking at them. And of
course he spent the first three quarters of an hour
last segment in this dealing with the Brent Spn's Bid
Bid project and all of the dreams and stuff and
things that others want to go along with it, which

(37:01):
in the final analysis there's no money for. So when
you hear people talk about all this, just remember there's
no money for it, and it's not likely. I think
maybe if a winning, a prayer or a miracle will happen,
it may come from Columbus or Frankfurt, but I highly
doubt that. And with Donald Trump taking over as president
again in vvak Ramaswammy and Elon Musk at the Helm

(37:25):
of Doge, I doubt we're going to see more federal
money coming at this project. Either the contract's been signed
designer build contract, they've already selected the contractor they've already
got a signed contract to do it. It's a finite
amount of money, so I guess let them talk. But
as we talked through it, it really is a work
of high comedy. And you know the use of the

(37:46):
west or the west side. I do note that there
are a whole lot of railroad lines over there, and
those are still used to a ferry goods through the area.
They're not getting rid of the railroads, are they no?

Speaker 2 (38:02):
Okay, Price Hill, Lower Price Hill, East Price Hill, West
Price Hill. They're still going to be the other side
of the tracks.

Speaker 1 (38:09):
All right, fair enough? Now moving over to property taxes,
everyone soiled themselves when they got the reassessment after COVID.
I know multiple people they had thirty percent increases and
you got seniors out there complaining there fixed incomes and
how can I handle this? They keep going up. We
know the price of real estate's gone up as a

(38:29):
natural reality. There is a solution. It must come from
Columbus here in the state of Ohio. And there was
a solution which sounded like a decent proposal to increase
the homestead exemption right that would help seniors primarily primarily Yes,
And it was signed, sealed, delivered that I think the
House already even voter on it overwhelmingly. The only thing

(38:50):
the Senate had to do was pick it up and
sign it, and the governor probably would have signed it.
But I read the statement of some senator that was Blessing,
I can't remember who. I think he's to say, well,
it really doesn't do quite as much or doesn't do enough.
So in other words, we're going to go into another
calendar year in another legislative session, and that means it's
going to be thrown out and they'll have to start

(39:11):
from scratch.

Speaker 2 (39:12):
Yeah. I don't know exactly what Bill Blessing's concerns are,
but most of the other politicians they probably don't want
to put a fix in because it's going to reduce
the amount of income coming into the state. I mean,
politicians have a hard time saying no, we don't want
more money from the taxpayers.

Speaker 1 (39:32):
Yeah. I know it's a systemic problem.

Speaker 2 (39:34):
Yes, but I think that the issues with the homestead exemption.
As the House passed it, it had a cap of
forty thousand dollars, so it was for It was basically
designed for homeowners, longtime homeowners who are now on Social Security,

(39:55):
and any property tax increases are going to hit those people.

Speaker 1 (39:59):
The heart artist, right, So that's why I thought it was.
It was, you know, a small bite at the apple
is better than nothing at all, and there may be
some wild, grand solution the Blessing or somebody else has
in the back of their mind. But the price tag
on it, as I read it, was only like one
hundred and ninety six million dollars. It really it didn't
add it up to much at all when it comes
to the amount of taxpayer dollars that got into Columbus. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (40:22):
I didn't see the numbers, so I don't know. It's
worth talking of mister Blessing about see what his issues are,
just see whether they can be fixed in the next session.

Speaker 1 (40:33):
Joe just said, yeah, I just get ready to say hey, Joe,
so you can get him on the Morning show. He
just he just uttered in my head said slim and none.

Speaker 2 (40:40):
That's too bad.

Speaker 1 (40:41):
I know it is, but we have that problem with
a lot of politicians. So Todd, I love the fact
that you're willing to talk about this. You unravel and
unfold these quite complex and difficult issues and the easy
to understand components, which is wonderful for me because you know,
quite often, like when we started this conversation, this whole
thing look like the peace of God passing all human understanding.

(41:03):
And you of course got me past that. I know
you helped out my listeners with it as well. And
even if you're outside the city of Cincinnati, and this
does affect northern Kentucky dramatically affects everybody in the greater
Cincinnati area. But just as a concept, when you talk
about government generally, and even just that point you made
about politicians Republican Democrat, they cannot cannot stop the flow

(41:26):
of money, and anything that's going to less than the
amount of money that goes into their coffers they're going
to be against. And I think we just hit the
nail on the head in terms of the broader problems
we face here in the country. Maybe that's where that
thirty seven trillion dollar debt came from. Exactly, Todd. It's
a wonderful man. Merry Christmas, you and yours I have
wonderful holidays, and you and I will definitely talk next year.

(41:47):
You're always welcome on the Morning show.

Speaker 2 (41:49):
Okay, Brian, thank you.

Speaker 1 (41:50):
Thanks brother e twenty five. Thanks for making it into
the studio too. I really appreciate that. Folks. I hope
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Speaker 2 (43:30):
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