What happens to Mr. Patel’s little hotel after the first five years? The new has worn off and for the sake of argument let’s say that he did make some huge mistakes in his market research and the business just isn’t there. Patel has taken the bulk of the tax deprecation in the first few years, the bet isn’t paying off, except now the former Days Inn is five years older too and now the hourly trade has found their way to the Holiday Inn Express. Except the hotel hasn’t been kept up to the standards of Holiday Inn so they have lost their franchise rights. Just like what happened to the old Holiday Inn here in Oak Ridge. Now we have a dumpy, no name small hotel in a residential neighborhood that caters to the hourly hotel crowd.

What does that do to the residential property values, not only around the hotel, but also all over Woodland? They plummet. All because the city fathers were too short sighted to see what a major impact this hotel could possibly have in a residential neighborhood if the scenario weren’t as rosy as the good Mr. Patel has explained. Don’t’ get me wrong. I don’t know Mr. Patel, so I’ll assume that he is a good and honest man. Good and honest men make mistakes everyday. The problem is that this one has the potential of negatively impacting a bunch of folks.

The whole thing boils down the math. Is the risk really worth the reward? Hey, it may very well be. The problem is that this city council isn’t going to spend too much time explaining that equation to the good folks in Woodland. They are gonna see a couple of short term dollar signs and gavel down.

While I don’t really think that this decision is going to have much of an impact on my family and I, I can’t help but feel badly for those that will be living next to this project. There will not be an up side for them. Until the entire area goes commercial and they can cash in.

Now, you quoted one part of my thing, but not the part when I said I don’t have a pony in that race. Really, I could care less. The point of the post (as you well know) was that the council is picking and choosing the issues it’ll deign to comment on.