By Samuel Strait – Reporter at Large – January 25, 2021 In a recently posted article by none other than Jessica Cejnar, "Crescent City introduces and is already chipping away at an Economic Development Plan", we will find a regurgitated narrative of what Crescent City imagines what "Economic Development" represents. The piece is clearly cringe worthy as she, the journalist, fails miserably by not asking such an obvious question, "What exactly in the entire piece represents any sort of economic development?" The City's finest is well verse in talking about Beach Front Park, Broadband, and HAS199.com, but what has that anything to do with the "Grand" plan to shake up the lack of any economic development what so ever in downtown Crescent City. As far as HAS199 is concerned, the harbor has been so poorly run for a couple of decades, at least to the point, it required a bed tax boost to stay solvent. The airport has a new terminal and jet service to Oakland, but has had its over all enplanements dwindle by just short of fifty percent. The sewer plant now several years old has yet to live up to its excessive over reach and can't make much progress towards paying down its debt with out making water and sewer services beyond the reach of many city residents. And finally the 199 Highway improvements held up by militant environmental activism, is unlikely to happen if the city's father continue to sit on their hands. Of course when it comes to economic development, the Crescent City Council hasn't a clue as to what it will take to make new businesses viable in downtown Crescent City. It most certainly isn't broadband, the Beach Front Park Project, or even the opening of the swimming pool at the expense of a half million dollars per year. It is hard to open a business when City government gets continually in the way. Most businesses in Del Norte County, let alone the City, must contend with an unequal competitive playing field of which recently both the County and the City have made it worse not better. It is hard to compete with businesses a mere 21 miles away when gasoline can be up to a dollar per gallon cheaper, sales tax is zero, and a wide variety of shops are not crowded out by big box stores. Especially when those same big box stores are allowed to remain open for the past year when many small businesses were forced to close or depend on random openings with yet more layers of regulation heaped on their backs. The latest closure: Wing Wah Restaurant in the Safeway Shopping Center. There is nothing about City Councilors who grandstand when talking about improvements to the City's irrelevancies, when real problems with the Council's decision making adds yet more burdens to existing businesses and makes it fool hardy for any one wishing to start one. As vacancies continue to multiply in the City's core, how is it that new residents will be attracted to the down town area? How is it that young people who already flood north for entertainment and shopping will remain in Crescent City when broader horizons beckon? How is it that these wandering youth will be beckoned back to Crescent City when good paying jobs are scarce and opportunities for a start up business is another mountain to climb? We already have enough taxpayer supported employees in this community without the tax base to support it. It has become so ingrained in this community and such a burden that "economic development" is but wishful thinking. The average salary in both the County and the City is skewed to the point that government pay totally overwhelms that of most in the private sector. When you add the benefit package most receive, small business find it difficult to even compete for the employees to operate. I see no evidence that the City is even aware of the problems most small businesses have to deal with on a day to day basis. What has been outlined here is only the tip of the proverbial iceberg, and Cejnar gives little to believe that the City's Council even cares enough to clean up their act. Workshops and paid consultants are but sophistry for the uninformed citizenry. A few more uninformed citizens do not make an unrealistic desire workable or successful. The reason two new members of the council were installed was due to the appalling shortsightedness of Crescent City's previous Mayor, Blake Inscore. In less than a calendar month, at least from the tone of the comments in Cejnar's article, the new members of the council are as clueless as the existing and former members of the Council. Let me repeat, swimming pools, park renovations, new city halls, pedestrian only cross walks, and highly compensated bureaucrats DO NOT MAKE FOR BETTER ECONOMIC CONDITIONS.