The Owers

The unfinished Elk Grove Promenade outdoor mall is now permanently on hold. The project has been cancelled due to lack of interest. There it sadly waits, longingly looking out towards all those Highway 99 commuter-consumers, listlessly awaiting the economic rebound that's shedjooled to return at the end of 2009.

Concurrent with this "rebound," Elk Grove will also need General Growth Properties to get their heads out of their asses and somehow turn up solvent again. They are the owners of the Promenade...well, owner is probably a misnomer, considering they don't really own anything, they owe everything. They are the owers of the mall.

As owers, they've got north of three billion in debt that has to be extended or refinanced this year, lest they go belly up. Actually, I might expect a larger competitor like Westfield to snatch them from the jaws of insolvency, which will, of course, lead to only one ower in the country, towards only one mega-mall-mega-ower. We'll see.

The city of Elk Grove is sitting around, waiting...waiting...waiting for all those millions in tax revenues to suddenly appear, blowing the city out of their economic doldrum. It's too bad, isn't it, that our city is utterly and wholly fiscally dependent on what a half dozen majority shareholders outside Chicago at General Growth do and think. We pin our economic hopes and aspirations on a single 1,100,000 sq. ft. 102-store mall owned by outsiders. No, we don't bother to build jobs into our "community" aside from the $8 retail, service, maintenance, and security jobs the mall will graciously provide. We take in these fake jobs (jobs that do nothing to grow our city, jobs whose taxes don't come close to servicing their living arrangements in suburbia), and neglect jobs that provide meaningful careers to people...doctoring, engineering, custom furniture building, agriculture, mechanics and masons.

No, instead of good jobs we're going to get a big plastic hot dog kiosk in the shape of a hot dog manned by minimum wage workers uniformed in hot dog outfits on the edge of the mall's food court, next to the obligatory China Express, Steak Escape, Burger King, Wetzels Pretzels, Mrs. Fields cookies, and Cinnabon cinnamon roll stores manned by their own casts of underpaid underbenefitted clowns. I will guarantee every one of these listed franchises will be in that food court even though the mall has never announced their food court tenants. You're not gonna find Elk Grove residents Tina and Cam Nguyen opening their own restaurant in the mall's food court...that would be illegal. They are not a chain, and are not franchisees. Locals are barred from such opportunities at the "local" mall. Think what they could provide for the community -- tailored food for targeted residents, business taxes that stay in Elk Grove, local ownership responsive to local needs, and a reason for a couple to work hard and evolve their business instead of simply shuffling between "employment opportunites" with out of state franchises. These benefits are exactly why it is illegal, why it is barred, why it will never happen. General Growth can't provide for shareholder growth with local involvement.

General Growth says in their public relations materials that their malls are more than just places to shop -- they are places to experience. I can see why. Here in Elk Grove we are all uninspired by our own neighborhoods with shitty car dependent layouts and even shittier architecture, we won't allow our children play outside due to our 31,477 registered sex offenders although we live in 'safe' suburbia, while our elderly parents are effectively trapped without a car of their own. Every one of us are looking for something more from our vast collections of noplaces...so into our vehicles we'll climb, and motor to the Promenade to have someplace to experience.