Moon Over Port Townsend

by | May 30, 2018 | General

The Battle of the Sexes has reached new depths of confusion. Not a day passes without some person being accused by some other person of some form of unseemly behavior, invariably linked to sex or something like sex. Some cases are very serious, like the rape charges against Bill Cosby and former Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. Others may involve retaliation against an accuser, as was alleged by a staff member of California Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia, who is accused of firing a male aide for refusing to play spin the bottle with her.
Most of what we read about involves people in positions of power exploiting those with no real means of fighting back. This power dynamic makes such harassment far more pernicious, but it can also distract us from other misconduct that does not involve famous, powerful people. Some complaints ring true and terrible while others suggest false outrage. In some instances, what used to be called flirting is now called harassment. What are we to think?
Some of this confusion came to Port Townsend May 11 when police responded to a report of a woman exposing her buttocks from the window of a truck. The term of art would be ‘mooning.’  According to Port Townsend Police Public Information Officer Keppie Keplinger, the 26-year-old mooner and the driver, a 42-year-old woman from Port Hadlock, were cited for not wearing seat belts. The woman exposing her rear end was also counseled against displaying her derrière from a moving vehicle. And that’s it.
One could be forgiven for wanting this woman frog-marched into the Jefferson County Courthouse, pants tightly cinched around her waist, and called to account for her behavior. I mean, we’re talking about the public display of one or more butt cheeks and God Knows What Else. If harassment is harassment no ifs, ands or buts (no pun intended), why should this woman be excused for exposing herself?
On the other hand, the response struck me as somewhat nostalgic, harkening back to a different time in America, when mooning was a prank for teenagers of all ages meriting little more than a stern finger-wagging. It turns out that exposing one’s buttocks and whatever lies between them is just fine. “It’s not a crime,” said Keplinger. Indeed, mooning has been adjudicated in numerous courts as a form of expression protected by the First Amendment of the Constitution.
We’re left with something of a conundrum. The Pound Me Too Movement (I refuse the made-up word ‘hashtag’) has made expressing admiration of a woman’s appearance tantamount to second-degree murder while a woman displaying her rear end at a stop light in Port Townsend gets a pass.
For those who say admiring a woman’s appearance may be uncomfortable for the recipient of the compliment, I submit that a full moon could be quite uncomfortable for its recipients, not to mention a dangerous distraction if you’re behind the wheel. But we who were not at the stop light on the corner of Haines Place and Sims Way on May 11 can never know how it felt to be on the receiving end of this display of female flesh.
Don’t get me wrong; this is not to conflate mooning with the behavior of Harvey Weinstein. There is no place for sexual harassment or assault – ever. But cultural norms and social mores are always in flux, and the very real risk to my wife and daughter and every other woman is that we’re defining deviancy down while defining the innocuous up. What once was taboo is now ordinary; what once was mundane is now criminal. It is the criminally mundane that marginalizes truly egregious conduct and the victims of it.
In the case of the Port Townsend Moon, the mundane is just that. It is no more a threat to society than winking at a member of the opposite sex across a crowded room. Rather, it is the cacophonous indignation over perceived slights and micro-aggressions that pose a greater threat to us. There’s a big difference between a moon from a passing truck, leaving one speechless, and being forced into speechlessness by the censorship that attends manufactured outrage.

Scott Hogenson is a resident of Jefferson County. His column will appear Wednesdays.  Responses, no more than 700 words, may be sent to ptfreepress@gmail.com.

ABOUT IPA, AND INTRODUCING OUR FIRST COLUMNIST

by | May 29, 2018 | General

We rate everything from Port Townsend Brewing as quaffable, top-notch suds.  That is our considered position on local beer and we’re sticking to it.

So much for a beer tasting review.  This is really about the last group of dancers in the Rhody FestivalParade.  I was told they call themselves The IPA.  Not India Pale Ale.  No, they are “The Intergalactic P**sy Alliance.”
You’d know how to fill in the missing letters if you had seen them.  A group of women in very short skirts, some not reaching their thighs so that their underwear was out in the open.  Their dance was nothing more than the thrusting of pelvises at the crowd.  They were nondiscriminatory:  men, women and children alike got the treatment.
The woman gyrating directly in front of me wore lacy undies and frantically pushed her pubic area at nearby onlookers.  Little was left to the imagination.  She appeared determined to make sure we all saw what she was revealing.  Desperate, even.  It wasn’t artful or entertaining.  It was aggressive.
Nothing was left to the imagination regarding another woman.  Was she even wearing anything under that strip of fabric that flapped as she bounced?  It didn’t look like it.
I wish I had had the presence of mind to take photos.  But then again, I don’t think I would publish them on this site.
This spectacle came in the same parade as marchers and floats of high school bands, people celebrating substance abuse recovery, local businesses, classic car buffs and electric vehicle activists, veterans, senior citizens, hospital workers, candidates for public office, first responders, the royalty of different area festivals, the missionaries of Youth with a Mission, a church’s day school.
What was the point of this aggressive display of female anatomy?  What were they saying?
Sure, you can say, “If you don’t like it, don’t watch.”  But families with children did not know what was coming until it was upon them.
If a group of men in jockstraps (or without anything under their kilts) suddenly faced the crowd and performed the same pelvic thrusts and exposed themselves, would it be acceptable?
Is this sexual harassment, or at least inappropriate sexual behavior that should be condemned? Charlie Rose, David Letterman, Matt Lauer, Harvey Weinstein—all of them are accused of exposing themselves to unwilling witnesses. Does the same standard apply to what concluded an otherwise family friendly-all-around-good-wholesome-fun Rhody Parade?
I mean, who asked if we wanted this thrown in our faces?
Is it okay if women expose themselves, but not men?  In the case of the vile famous men just mentioned, they wielded power over female victims.  That is a critical factor in those cases.  But, to be fair, the IPA women also possessed some degree of power and responsibility which they used without consideration for their audience.
Maybe the whole purpose was to be “in your face.”  That, in itself, implies a power imbalance.  What were the families seated on the curbs, on blankets and in folding chairs to do, run away?
I just don’t know.  It didn’t seem the classiest way to end a lovely parade showcasing the best in our community.  I’ve heard from other people on the receiving end of this crude choreography.  They also felt disappointed, even victimized to some extent.
I’m not the only one wondering about things like this.  Tomorrow’s column by Scott Hogenson shares his thoughts in Moon Over Port Townsend.  “Moon,” not as in a lunar event, but in a woman pushing posterior flesh out a truck window at Sims Way and Haines Place and how our police responded.

Scott’s columns will likely be provocative.  Let me restate that:  Scott’s columns will definitely be provocative.  I may not agree with what he says. This will be his column expressing his unique viewpoint.  We welcome well-written responses to Scott and will be happy to publish them.  No more than roughly 700 words, please, the same rule Scott works under.

CHERRY STREET “AFFORDABLE” HOUSING TO COST MORE THAN $2 MILLION

CHERRY STREET “AFFORDABLE” HOUSING TO COST MORE THAN $2 MILLION

by | May 28, 2018 | General

$401 per square foot……$167,196 per bedroom……$250,794 per apartment……and counting……

The City of Port Townsend is financing some of the most expensive residential construction in Jefferson County in the name of “affordable” housing. Costs have grown far above early estimates and now a hidden subsidy has pushed the projected price of the Cherry Street project over $2 million.

The mid-Twentieth Century building was purchased in Victoria, B.C., barged across the Strait of Juan de Fuca, hauled through a city that had stopped traffic and taken down utility lines, and settled on stacks of wood on May 10, 2017. This is what it looks like more than a year later. It remains unoccupied and without a foundation.

Bedroom

Cherry Street bedroom (from Homeward Bound FB page)

Living Area

Cherry Street living area (from Homeward Bound FB page

Kitchen

Cherry Street kitchen (from Homeward Bound FB page)

Four new one-bedroom apartments are to be added under the building, in addition to the four two-bedroom units already there.

The cost of the project has grown dramatically.

The first reported total cost was $475,00.  That was April 2017.

In September 2017, David Timmons, PT’s City Manager, said the total cost of the project would be $672,689.  That included a $250,000 loan to Homeward Bound Community Land Trust, a then defunct non-profit that would own and operate the building.  Timmons did not include the land in the estimated project cost.  The 1.36 acre parcel of City-owned land was sold to Homeward Bound for only $1.  Records reviewed at the Development Department Services reveal the land had been appraised at $600,000.

Timmons and the City resisted including the cost of the land in the project cost, even though Michelle Sandoval, a city councilor and prominent realtor, has described that land as “valuable.”  The Port Townsend Leader initially also excluded the value of the land in its reporting on the project’s cost.  The Jefferson County GOP, in a complaint to the city regarding the delay in giving the building a foundation and the unstable appearance of the wood stack supports, was the first entity to insist that the value of the donated land be included in the project’s overall cost.  (The author of this article was part of that effort).  Subsequent to the GOP’s complaint, The Leader began including the cost of the land in its reporting.

Homeward Bound couldn’t do anything without getting organized.  They were well-meaning people but were in disarray.  They had never undertaken anything of this scale and they needed help.  The City gave them $30,000 to get going.

Fast forward:  May 7, 2018, it is a business meeting of the Port Townsend City Council. (The video of the relevant portion of the meeting can be watched here).  Homeward Bound cannot get a loan to finish the project unless the City acts as guarantor.  To be in a safer position, the City decides to borrow what is needed itself, issue a bond to get it done, then issue a line of credit to Homeward Bound to be repaid over 40 years out of rental income from the project.  The line of credit also replaces the initial loan to Homeward that had already been extended until the end of 2018 because the group had no assets or income with which to pay its debt.  See Agenda Bill AB19-053.

It is a good deal for Homeward Bound.  They have no skin in the game.  If they default or fail to operate the project as affordable housing, they only have to give the property back to the city  (the “reverter” agreement).  Nobody is personally responsible.  Better yet, Homeward Bound need not make any payments for the first two years.

The costs to be covered by the City’s line of credit to Homeward Bound have now ballooned to $834,000, which includes a $130,000 contingency.  That is only the principal amount of the bond.(The City has not conducted its own cost projection and is relying exclusively on numbers provided by Homeward Bound).

Remember, there are other costs that must be added in.  The Leader finally tried getting the math right, concluding that total cost of the project could reach $1.6 million when all costs–such as acquisition, transportation, construction, land and financing–are included.  That came to $200,000 per unit, or $133,333 per bedroom.

But there’s more: Almost another half million dollars from taxpayers will pour into these eight apartments.

About That Hidden Subsidy

At the May 7, 2018 Port Townsend City Council business meeting, City Manager Timmons revealed that the loan between the City and Homeward Bound needed a “subsidy to make the numbers work.”  In other words, after the building was finished and fully leased, it would not generate sufficient income for Homeward Bound to cover its debt.  Over the course of the meeting Mr. Timmons explained that there was a $400,000 subsidy, a form of free financing or debt forgiveness, folded into the agreement.  He also called this “an indirect grant.”

Later in the meeting, he said the subsidy came to $413,000.  But according to the Agenda Bill which provided the statement of the project financing, the subsidy would actually be $451,115.

The vote to issue and sell the bond and make the loan to Homeward Bound was 5-1, with only councilman Robert Gray voting “nay.”  Councilwoman Michelle Sandoval was absent.

The total cost of the bond approved by City Council, as documented on the bond repayment schedule, comes to $1,367,355.  That is the amount the city is obligated to repay.  Add in the value of the land ($600,000)  and the organization grant ($30,000).  The City has also donated free water line work, but we have not seen that reduced to a dollar figure and thus cannot include that expenditure in this tally at this time.

Based on what we know for sure:

The tab for the eight apartments is projected to reach $2,006,355.

—$2,006,355—

Looked at another way, that is $250,794 per apartment.
That is $167,196 per bedroom.
Estimating the Cherry Street project at 5,000 square feet (as reported by the Leader), the cost for the “affordable” Cherry Street project is $401 per square foot.
$401per square foot makes the Cherry Street project one of the priciest residential structures in the area.  It puts these apartments for low and very low income renters in the luxury housing category.  A search of Zillow and Redfin listings for Port Townsend found only two properties that came with a higher cost per square foot than the Cherry Street “affordable housing” project.  Both those homes–they could be called mansions–are less than twenty years old and located on bluffs directly over water that offer million dollar views.

Apartment Hunting

Not far from Cherry Street an apartment complex with 12 3-bedroom apartments (36 bedrooms) is for sale for the asking price of $1.5 million.  It is approximately forty years newer than the Cherry Street building.

In November 2017, City Manager Timmons said the Cherry Street project could have its foundation finished in four months.  Seven months later, no work has begun.

NEXT MONDAY:  Why It Matters