Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Wed. wats.

Much as I appreciate the rain (I was thinking about resorting to breaking out the watering hoses for my garden, cause I was afraid my plants were being freeze dried) I'm sure it will put a damper on sales for the rest of the week.

It's kind of the end of our lucky streak. The weather was so uniform this shopping season that I think it helped. There wasn't the usual one or two inexplicable clunker days.

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I'm proud of myself for figuring out the Hamlet connection to Sons of Anarchy all by my lonesome.

Linda and I have blown through 10 episodes. (They are relatively short, at about 39 minutes.)
For those of you who are way ahead of us on what's happened, please don't tell. For those of you who haven't started watching, there be spoilers ahead.

In the show, Jax (Hamlet) spends much of his time in the ramparts (the roof of the garage) communing the dead ghost of his dad (in the form of diaries.)

The one thing that bothers me about the show, is sometimes they seem to try a little too hard for the swaggering tough guy effect -- which can have the opposite effect of reminding me that they are all just actors, after all.

I think it's partly because of the shortness of the show, that things that can be a little more developed on HBO or Showtime, with an extra 10 or 15 minutes, in this show seem to be slightly telegraphed.

It's a problem with all tough guys shows, really. I remember seeing French Connection last year, and what had seemed so gritty and real when I was young seemed slightly fake and almost cartoony.

The actor's are mostly pulling it off -- so I'm not sure if the problem is the writing or the actors or just that they are talking about a foreign world and trying to show the "hearts of gold" and all that and it somehow doesn't quite seem -- realistic.

It walks a very narrow line, and pulls it off -- mostly.

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So far, we haven't had a single return. (knock wood). They may still all come in like an avalanche, but so far so good.

I'm very casual about telling the customers that if it isn't the right thing, they can exchange it for anything in the store.

We try not to give cash back -- but sometimes you just can't avoid it. But it sure hurts when it happens.

Exchanges? Those only make sense.

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I did my December orders yesterday, and allowed myself to order all the "cool" stuff I saw -- and it came in about 25% higher than is healthy.

Is the store strong enough to take the chance? If I order 25% more, can I sell about 15% more to cover it?

This kind of thing almost never pans out, but occasionally -- it does. And it's how the store takes a step forward. It's that risky move that you can usually avoid taking -- but not always.

I'll add up the Christmas profits, see how far down I'm paying on the debts, and make my decision by Thursday. I more or less already made the big gamble this Christmas -- so I need to see how that panned out by paying all the bills and seeing what's left.

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That the Parks and Rec district has millions to spend on land points to the off-kilter nature of public funding. I'm sure there are firewalls protecting the money from raids by other entities who might need to money more...in the short term.

In the long term, I think they are being smart snapping up the land while they can.

As you know, my belief is that Central Oregon is fundamentally a tourist and retirement economy and will mostly remain so.

It makes sense to have as many park amenities as possible.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

This might be a good time to remind people that Bend Park & Recreation is a separate entity is NOT part of the City of Bend. The real challenge for Park & Rec is how to allocate / balance available funds to current operations and future projects.

H. Bruce Miller said...

The Bullshittin had a curious editorial today re the prospect of a new fitness center on the old Mt. Bachelor parking lot site, warning that Park & Rec should be careful not to hurt other, private fitness centers on the west side. They can only be talking about the Athletic Club. But why does The Bullshittin give a rip about the fortunes of the Athletic Club? Because Costa likes to go there and is afraid he might have to rub elbows with the unwashed rabble at a (shudder!) public facility if it folds? It's puzzling.

RDC said...

If you look at things, why should Parks and Rec build a fitness center? A city building a fitness center was a reasonable idea back in the 60-70's, prior to the the rise of the fitness industry.
There is not exactly a shortage for access. So the only reasons would be if:

1. There is not reasonable fitness club capacity
2. Those clubs that are available are extremely expensive compared to the norm for such facilities and the cost of providing services.
3. They want to privde a capability that the commercial clubs do not such as an indoor pool for example.

If not then it is true that they are entering into a business competitive with existing businesses without a valid reason.

If 3 then they should scale it to provide that capability.

If they are doing that then why don't they start up a bicycle sales and rental store.

Maybe they should branch into ski sales as well.

Most cities are finding that they cannot provide fitness services for less than the commercial players can and often they end up having to provide substantial subsidies that take away from other projects.

H. Bruce Miller said...

RDC: The Athletic Club of Bend IS very expensive, with the cost of membership far out of reach of most citizens of Bend. Aside from it, there are no comparable facilities on Bend's west side. And the Juniper Fitness Center on the east side is severely overcrowded.

"Most cities are finding that they cannot provide fitness services for less than the commercial players can"

I don't know about other cities, but that isn't the case in Bend. Park & Rec (which, as Bike Bend pointed out above, is a separate entity from the city and thus is not sucking money away from city services) is in strong financial shape. The cost of membership at Juniper is a small fraction of the cost at the Athletic Club; presumably memberships at the new center -- if there ever is one -- would be similarly priced.

Anyway, I'm always hearing from conservatives that the private sector can do everything cheaper and better than the public sector, so why should the Athletic Club have to fear competition from a public facility? (Yes, I'm being snarky.)

But seriously: I think concerns about the new center putting the AC out of business are overblown. The AC is more posh and offers more amenities (a restaurant, indoor tennis courts, etc.) than the new center is likely to have and will continue to appeal to our more "upscale" (i.e., snobbish) citizens.

Anonymous said...

No different than cities providing public golf courses. There will always be a need for both private and public facilities. Many government park and rec provide sports facilities. As a property tax payer (which a portion of funds the park and rec) I expect sports facilities to be built.

In addition, the rec center that is being discussed would be a joint venture with the community college. Communitiy colleges can not expect their students to join a fitness club with high recurring charges.

Parks and rec is seeing an opportunity to purchase prime real-estate at a time when prices are depressed. They are looking very long term. I applaud them for this.

RDC said...

If there is that much demand and the prices are that high then one would expect a major player to enter the market such as a 24 hour fitness or other national chain.

There are plenty of companies in this space and they have been very willing to expand into areas of opportunity. Such companies provide very in expensive memberships. I paid $25 per month at a 24 hour fitness in San Diego for example.

It would be far less expensive for the Parks and Rec department to approach commenrcial firms and brief them on their information that there is substantial unmet demand. If their numbers are ture then you would see other players move in. If the opportunity is not attractive then it would be a clear signal that the demand is really not their and a signal that the Parks and Rec project would not be successful.

The bottom line is if Parks and Rec provides it then it will end up being revenue negative and will require a subsidy. I have not seen a city provided facility of this kind anywhere that has been revenue positive.

The issue is not the success or failure of any one club it is the government spending a large amount of money to provide a service that is easily provided commercially. In which case the governemnts money could be used for other projects that cannot be provided commercially.

RDC said...

How many cities are continuing with providing City run golf courses these days? Not many. The construction of city gold courses was big in the 50-60's when the number of golf courses was much lower, and most were private. Now with a pretty large number of golf courses and most being open to the public (not requiring memberships) that practice is for cities to shutdown their courses because they are money drains.

If the Community College wants to fund a facility out of their student fees they certainly can do so.

The real question is what will this cost, what is the funding and the guarentee from the community college, what are the fees going to be to the participants and will this break even on an operational basis. I would rather see the money going into parks and rec facilities that cannot be provided commercially such as land acquisition for trails or parks.

By the the cost will end up the same for the students. If the facility is run atleast operationally breakeven then the fees, if not paid by individual student memberships, will be paid through fees colleted from the students, in which case the students wont even have a choice on how they would spend that money it would automatically come out of their tuition and fees. At least with a well run commercial facility they would have the choice if they wanted a membership or not.

Anonymous said...

SOA is addictive. I think you hit the nail on the creative challenges of working within a 42 minute time frame — some things feel rushed. Note, too, that the show has operated on a very small budget, though bigger the past 2 seasons. Justified is another FX show that does well with its storytelling despite a miniscule budget.

In some ways, I think modest resources force better writing, but I'm sure there's always the "I'd have done it THIS way if I had the time/money."

Jim

H. Bruce Miller said...

"The bottom line is if Parks and Rec provides it then it will end up being revenue negative and will require a subsidy. I have not seen a city provided facility of this kind anywhere that has been revenue positive."

RDC, people with your mindset just don't get it and probably never will. The purpose of government is not to be "revenue positive," i.e. turn a profit. The purpose of government is to provide public services.

Public schools don't turn a profit. Public parks don't turn a profit. Public libraries don't turn a profit. Public highways don't turn a profit. Public police forces and fire departments don't turn a profit.

Would you argue on that basis that they should be eliminated?

Yeah, you probably would.

RDC said...

The purpose of government is to provide necessary services. Especially those that only government can provide.

In this case the services are ones that can be provided by many others than the city government. As such considering how cash strapped the government is, there are higher priorities than to set up a money losing business, that will probably require substantial subsidies in the future (kind of the like the grandiose plan for a bus system which I recall you also supported at the time).

There are lots of ways to get a fitness center which would not require a dime of governmet expendature if the demand is really there.

It sould like the finances are really dependant upon the community college funding it with student fees. Of which a pretty large number will never set foot in it. Yet people wonder why college fees keep going up and up and up.


The point which you will never get is that money that the governemtn collects should not just be spent because something is a good idea. It should meet a pretty high hurdle in delivering value. Because unlike a company where people can choose to buy a product or not. The goverment takes money from people and spends it upon things that they have no control over. That means that governemtns should be very priority focused and be very frugal on where they decide to spend money.

In a multitude of projects such as the bus system and others Bend has repeatedly demonstrated that it is very good at wasting money.

RDC said...

By the way while the approach of trying to extend a concept to an unreasonable level, such as your equating the concept of a profitable fitness center with all other services needing to be profitable is an debating technique. It really adds nothing to the merits of the conversation. Clearly many government services are not profitable. But they certainly should be well managed and prioritized. Compared to services such a public safety (police and fire), education, transportation, etc. Subsidizing a fitness facility is way way down the priority list.

If the Park and Rec has money that they don't know what to do with they can always return it to the taxpayers.

Anonymous said...

RDC claims:
"The purpose of government is to provide necessary services. Especially those that only government can provide."

Actually, that's not correct.

The purpose of government is to provide those services requested by the governed.

The vast majority of those services benefit the governed (read "general public"), thus enhancing the quality of life for the majority of the governed either directly or indirectly. This is why we have public police, public / volunteer fire protection and public schools. Imagine the chaos and unequal protection if there were only private police or private fire protection. Actually you don't have to imagine - just read some history.

Sometimes only the government has the financial resources and political power to be able to provide the services the governed want.

So, if the governed deem that something like a west side fitness center would add to the general population's quality of life then so be it.

And RDC, just as there are poorly managed private, for-profit businesses there will also be poorly managed, not-for-profit government services. Does that mean that we should never let people attempt to operate private, for-profit businesses since they might be poorly managed?

You used a poor example of government mismanagement; the bus purchase in arguing against a west side fitness center. A much better example would be to look at the very long and successful history of the BMP&R District and note that, as an example, the Juniper Fitness center has been successfully providing unbroken quality services to the governed for many decades while a substantial number of private fitness centers have come and gone during the same time - sometimes defrauding the membership out of prepaid dues.

Has BPM&R District been managed perfectly? Of course not, but I challenge you to name a single for-profit business that has been in business for many decades that hasn't made a few management mistakes.

I realize that it's hard for you to see the larger picture but not everything operates best in an unfettered, unregulated marketplace. History, recent and otherwise, has proven and unfortunately re-proven that bit of wisdom again and again.

RDC said...

Bike Bend,

Good comment for most of it, at least until the last paragraph where you went into more of an attack. For which since you don't know me or my motivations can only be perceived that way.

While I certainly agree with your comment about the purpose of government is to provide services requested by the governed if this went to a referendom of the voters in Bend do you think that it would receive a majority vote?

While the comment about services is valid, we unfortunately do not live in a system where each decision can really express the view of the people. Instead we live in a system where we elect positions in government, but most of those are hired, not elected. Most of the decisions made are not necessarily the desires of the people except at the broadest interpretation. The people certainly want police forces and the stability of law, but the level of the police budget is outside of their direct control.

If you were to take the money that it would take to build the proposed center and really ask the people if they would want the money to go towards:

1. Schools
2. Police
3. Roads
4. Open Space (had to add a P& R one here)
5. Fitness center
6. low income housing

How do you think that vote would turn out? Do you think that the fitness center would be the top? For that matter would it be in the top 3.

You can put forth your patitudes about big picture. I can just as well do the same.


Companies make errors. Never said that they didn't. However, what I come back to, and it is the same position I had when I worked in government (at the state and federal level), that government should have a high hurdle to meet on any decision to spend funds. That an employee of Government has a higher standard than one of a Corporation. The reason is while one may not like Corporations one can always decide if they want to buy a service from a Company or not. They cannot do so when it comes to government. Government has the power to tax and to do so without an individual having the option to say no. The closest you get to that with a Corporation is in the case of utilities and in those cases they are regulated by and allowed their monopoly status by Government.


While I do not have access to the internal finances of this project I suspect that it is pretty much along these lines. Park and Rec has the capital dollars available that they can spend on the project. The Community College through their ability to set fees for students can charge all students a rec free and direct a substantial portion of that to the fitness center. The Community College gets to market the rec center and say that they are providing it as a service, without having to provide the Capital Funds. Some students will use it, many probably will not. The arrangement will be attractive to Park and Rec because they will be collecting funds from a much wider base than the number of people that actually use it to support operating costs. Similarly if it requires additional subsidy it can get drawn from across the entire population of Bend, for the benefit of those that actually use it.

H. Bruce Miller said...

RDC: "In this case the services are ones that can be provided by many others than the city government. As such considering how cash strapped the government is, there are higher priorities"

First, the services are NOT being provided by many others, at least not at prices that are affordable to most citizens of Bend. Second, to repeat: The City of Bend and the Bend Metro Parks & Recreation District are completely separate entities. Parks & Rec has its own tax base, gets no money from the city and is not cash-strapped.

"In a multitude of projects such as the bus system and others Bend has repeatedly demonstrated that it is very good at wasting money."

What examples can you cite besides the bus system? If there are a "multitude" of them you should have no trouble coming up with at least two or three.

The real reason Bend is financially screwed is that for decades it has allowed development to proceed at a breakneck pace without having an adequate mechanism to pay for the expensive infrastructure such development requires. Instead it tried to pay for it through property tax revenues from anticipated future development -- essentially a Ponzi scheme. When the real estate boom ended the Ponzi scheme collapsed. Now the city can't even afford to fill the potholes.

H. Bruce Miller said...

"If you were to take the money that it would take to build the proposed center and really ask the people if they would want the money to go towards:

1. Schools
2. Police
3. Roads
4. Open Space (had to add a P& R one here)
5. Fitness center
6. low income housing"

Perhaps a valid argument if Parks & Rec was funded from the city tax base, but as has repeatedly been pointed out, it ain't.

H. Bruce Miller said...

"By the way while the approach of trying to extend a concept to an unreasonable level, such as your equating the concept of a profitable fitness center with all other services needing to be profitable is an debating technique. It really adds nothing to the merits of the conversation."

I don't think it's an unreasonable argument at all; all of these services were, at various times and places, provided by private enterprise, and some people think they still should be.

RDC said...

Take the one off of the list that is parks and Rec and conduct a survey if they should spend money on the fitness center or on more open space or more trails

I suspect that more open space or more trails would win.

AS far as the cost issue. It will only be lower because Parks and Rec has the tax base and those that use it will be subsidized by a much larger number of Bend residents that do not.

RDC said...

Take the one off of the list that is parks and Rec and conduct a survey if they should spend money on the fitness center or on more open space or more trails

I suspect that more open space or more trails would win.

AS far as the cost issue. It will only be lower because Parks and Rec has the tax base and those that use it will be subsidized by a much larger number of Bend residents that do not.