Juniper Ridge: Our Gleaming City in the Sky.

It's amazing how stubbornly Bend sticks to its original vision of Juniper Ridge. It was probably never realistic, and is -- in my opinion -- simply not possible now, or for the foreseeable future.

"Why Not Juniper Ridge?" the Bulletin asks, in today's cover story. Why aren't we getting data centers, the way Prineville does?

What was interesting is that there is still a snobbish rejection of such an "ugly" facility. The technical reasons for Facebook not coming to Juniper Ridge seem real: lack of flat land, nearness of the railroad, the limited tax incentives. (3 to 5 years, versus the 15 in Prineville).

Not to contradict myself, but I do buy the notion that we want people who are actually willing to pay a little more to be here. Not give away the farm in incentives.

But I don't buy the aesthetic argument. We can't afford that.

I also don't understand why Juniper Ridge land would still be more than double in land price. Where's the supply and demand equation? It's admitted that nothing is selling out there; "Yellow signs of dead ends."

I suspect that's because Bend has sunk so much money in the place, that they are still trying to get a higher rate. Like a homeowner who bought at the peak, and who wants to sell his house for what he paid, instead of the going rate.

And they are probably right that they would slammed for selling the land cheaper than what they put into it. But you know what? They fucked up. They need to take their lumps and start selling land for the going rate.

But what if we recover? What if the land becomes valuable? What if we could have had better tenants later?

Is there any sign of that, so far? I could hold all the merchandise in my store for what I think the stuff will sell for in 10 years, and no doubt it will be higher, but meanwhile I go out of business.

They turn their nose up at data centers and point to Les Schwab as a positive example. I'm not so sure. We pulled away jobs from another Central Oregon town, which seems somewhat predatory and cannibalistic. (Maybe Schwab should have saved the money from moving and started paying their assistant managers a proper wage.)

Councilor Clinton talks about a 50 to 100 year vision for Juniper Ridge. Which is ridiculous. Planning for 50 to 100 in policy terms, in land use laws, in tax planning, make perfect sense. Planning 50 to 100 years for a physical development is utterly foolhardy.

He still is holding out on the idea of a "research university."

Has there been even the slightest hint that that could happen? Has anyone expressed the slightest interest?

Sounds very pie-in-the-sky. It wasn't that many years ago, that even the modest C.O.C.C. expansion into 4 years was nearly defunded.

Finally the "luck" argument.

Sorry, don't buy it. It wasn't luck that Bend sunk a ton of ill-planned and ill-managed money into a huge development during a boom, without considering the possibility of a crash. And it certainly wasn't luck that made them continue to sink money into the development long after the crash was clearly happening.

And it isn't luck that they still haven't come around to recognizing reality.