"Downtown belongs to everyone …"
“Downtown belongs to everyone. This is where our cultural heart is. This is where our civic center, our library, our jewels are.”
- Jeff Bezdek, responding to comments by Ward 7 Councilman Skip Kelly that investment downtown doesn’t benefit the entire city.
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Just watched the city council meeting online. I was very impressed by Bezdek’s articulate and thoughtful presentation…he represents the growing community of extremely bright young professionals in OKC with a passion for civic involvement and progressive change.
I’m a little worried about Councilman Kelly’s and Walter’s comments. They seem preoccupied with geographical territorialism and do not appreciate downtown’s presence as “everyone’s space”. Haven’t all of the previous MAPS projects benefited the Central Core only (with the exception of MAPS for Kids)? And haven’t these projects benefited all Oklahoma City citizens and visitors, despite their geographical specificity?
When I said “benefited the Central Core only” I meant, “been constructed in the Central Core only”…my point being they have benefited everyone.
I found Walters very ignorant and almost rude to the presentation at hand. How does he know for a fact if the modern streetcar would fail? Fact really is, that he doesn’t know. The reason our Trolley and Bus ridership is so low is because of their poor management and non reliability that aren’t remotely viable to any person in this city that is determined to travel via means other than a car.
And wait, isn’t Kelly advocating the renewal of 23rd? I’m pretty sure that’s a downtown investment. I’m curious. Where does Councilman Walters live?
From day 1 Walters has been extremely territorial. If memory serves me correctly the first big thing he was upset about was more roads were being resurfaced in other districts and he threatened to vote against it, but when other council members reminded him that his district had the best roads in the city (based on when they were built or last resurfaced), he finally backed down.
Not long after he got elected I also remember him basically warning that he could not (probably) support another MAPS unless it had a project in his district. It was the whole “southside has been left out” argument.
For anyone to say the the MAPS projects haven’t or don’t help the city as a whole, well thats pure ignorance! It seems to me that Councilman Walters is a bit selfish or perhaps slow? What tourists want to come to OKC to see the southside? I’m almost positive that they would want to see all the wonderful things that we’ve made a reality in the last 10 years. I think that they would want to see more of the same. I’m 24 and thought for part of my life that i wanted to move away to someplace more exciting and now that someplace has come to fruition before my eyes! I’v never been more proud of my hometown, nor do i want to leave for ‘someplace more exciting’ any longer. I am so excited to see what we can pull out of our hat next. And Steve, I love your blog! I check it everyday and i love all of you coverage of downtown.
I figured he represented some portion of suburban living.
What’s funny is, that portion of OKC, the far southside, is extremely well taken care of. He is very ignorant to the situation at hand. Unless he didn’t notice, the downtown core is just now beginning it’s major revitalization while the suburban portions of OKC have never experienced such a depression that our “jewels” have endured. They need and deserve to be remediated and taken care of. Downtown is the beginning of OKC, it is our essence, and Bezdeck is right, it’s our cultural heart.
At least this partially answers my questions as to where other council members may stand on a new MAPS vote. To think that improving downtown does not benefit the entire city is the height of naivete. Surely he can’t be serious. With that logic, we should be able to completely demolish everything downtown without harming the entire city either. How can you possibly argue with such flawed logic?!? You can’t so I won’t…but if this is what passes for our city leaders, I am getting a little scared. With comments like this it makes me want to run for office myself to “throw the bums out.”
In regards to Michael’s comments about south OKC, we were very well represented for many years by Jerry Foshee. Walters replaced him and has been a completely ineffectual incompetent. In a position where consensus building is key to getting anything done, he has isolated himself by being on the wrong side of almost every issue. He is a mistake that we in south OKC will correct when he comes up for reelection.
Interesting because Walters represents the highest per capita income zip code in the OKC metro and yet he is railing against basically the rest of OKC. This is called ignoring a social responsibility, and it’s a big thing that has prevented OKC from blossoming into a city that is great.
Our jewels?