Bill Meyer Show Podcast - Sponsored by Clouser Drilling www.ClouserDrilling.com - 10-09-25_THURSDAY_6AM

Episode Date: October 9, 2025

10-09-25_THURSDAY_6AM...

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Starting point is 00:00:00 The Bill Meyer Show podcast is sponsored by Klausur drilling. They've been leading the way in Southern Oregon well drilling for over 50 years. Find out more about them at Klausordrilling.com. Here's Bill Meyer. Conspiracy Theory Thursday. Talk is welcome, 7705-633. I mean, not that I'm always open to a good story or a good theory. May as long as you're making some sense.
Starting point is 00:00:23 Sometimes, as you know, some of the callers, even if you don't make sense. But if it's interesting, but if it's interesting, we'll take care of. that small town and just having fun with you this morning on conspiracy theory Thursday. He got some great conversation coming up this morning, though. Chris Hauer is going to be joining me. He's a disaster response and telecom national security spokesperson for Sat 1, 2, 3. This is a satellite phone and kind of a satellite communications kind of group just so you know. But it's about, well, especially disaster response. Needless to say, he's always looking out there at cyber security. And there's been a lot of stories coming out.
Starting point is 00:01:00 recently. Now there's talk that the government shutdown, the partial government shutdown, may be actually leaving America's digital defenses a bit exposed because the cybersecurity and infrastructure security agency has been furloughed too. And I didn't know that, but that's interesting. I'll talk with him about it. And also another story that I wanted to ask him about, and that was this encircling of certain cities in the United States. with how we just say foreign network surveillance. And you may recall that story. I think it was about 10, 12 days ago,
Starting point is 00:01:40 kind of came up and then went away. But there were like hundreds of thousands of phone SIM cards that were discovered in a lab, so to speak, or kind of like a, it ended up being broken up. It was disrupting a network that threatened the UN General Assembly. and they seized more than 300 sim servers, 100,000 cards, threats to U.S. officials, all sorts of stuff. And, you know, we heard about that story. Then it kind of went away.
Starting point is 00:02:10 Well, Chris is going to kind of flesh that out a little bit because I don't really understand what was at stake here, you know, the whole thing. And I, because I'm not a cyber security kind of guy, but since Chris is, well, ask him a few questions. He'll be calling the show. And that ought to be pretty darn interesting, all right? and let's see what else do we got going on this morning oh yeah we have ed deal is going to be joining me state representative ed deal we're going to be talking about getting this repeal the huge tax increase on the ballot and i want to ask them about a few other things especially when it comes to this uh medicare medicaid oregon health funding
Starting point is 00:02:50 Oregon Health Plan funding situation because it's starting to look like, you know, I never want to be someone just gives you talking points all the time. And I said, Ed, I would like to talk with you about what's really going on with these Obamacare subsidies because you have the Democrats out there bleeding and making hay that a lot of people are going to be hurt about this. And I was reading this story yesterday on KOBI. They're talking about a woman over in Gold Beach area or something like that, and it's going to have her insurance with the Obamacare subsidy going away. Going up to 1,250 a month, I think, is what the story was talking about.
Starting point is 00:03:33 I'm just spittballing on that a little bit, but it was a lot of money, and she was a person of modest income. Now, what they did not say, though, is if this person was a citizen or not, and as I was talking with Ed, I said, hey, hey, well, come on talk about this, but I'd also like to get to the bottom of this because Ed Deal is also on the health committee, the health committee in the state legislature after that Javad E guy ended up by getting bounced out. So he's kind of plugged right into this. And I want to do more than just give you the standard talking points of, you know,
Starting point is 00:04:08 the Republicans are saying, oh, it's about, you know, it's about illegal alien health care. And it certainly is about that, but is it only about that? and even Ed was saying, well, yeah, there's a little more to it. It's a little more complex. And I want to do that. I want to, of course, when it comes right down to it, the big problem that we're dealing with is that Obamacare has broken insurance. It has broken insurance markets.
Starting point is 00:04:32 It has broken the medical system, too, for that matter. And maybe that was this, you know, the whole plan all along, get everybody just, you know, broken so you're calling out for single-payer health care and going with the, a mom-dani kind of way, that sort of thing. All right. So we got that story coming up with that deal. And, you know, I've never talked to anybody about the screw worm. Because when I heard the term flesh-eating screw worm,
Starting point is 00:04:59 sounds like a horror movie for Halloween coming up here for the Halloween season. But no, it's actually a big threat at the border. And I'm going to talk with some candle people, actually a company that makes this technology to monitor the cows remotely. You guys remote control cows. How about that? but I guess the screw worm thing that they're talking about south of the border really is huge, can kill a cow in two weeks, and it has been detected getting closer to the United States.
Starting point is 00:05:27 Definitely a type of illegal alien that we do not want coming across the border. So it's a big deal for the cows. I like cows. They taste great. All right. Other stories this morning, Oregon National Guard troops can remain under Trump's control, but the appeals court, remember we were mentioning yesterday, was going to be the court hearing on it, but they cannot deploy to Portland. This according to
Starting point is 00:05:53 a panel of the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, this in Oregon Live yesterday. They issued the temporary hold as the judges prepped to hear arguments Thursday morning on whether to grant a full hold based on the merits. And so it's intended to minimize harm while an appellate court deliberates and lasts no longer than necessary to make an intelligent decision. So anyway, they're going to under, so it's going to stay under Trump's control, but he can't employ it to Portland. So it's sort of like half a loaf
Starting point is 00:06:23 right now. So they're going to be debating or deliberating a bit more, and then we should find out more. All right. Republicans, by the way, also in the Oregonian, rather, Republicans cautious regarding the National Guard, Oregon Republican leaders
Starting point is 00:06:40 at the state and federal level stopping short of calling for National Guard intervention in Portland. In statements and interviews, Representative Cliff Bence, Congressman Vince, rather, Republican leader Bruce Starr, House Majority Leader Lucetta Ilmer, former House Minority Leader Dresen, all expressing frustration with protests at ICE, but asked if they support President Donald Trump's attempt to deploy National Guard troops. The Republicans said they either thought the president was within his rights or that they understood why he did it, but they're not rallying behind this. Most said they want local police to step up and take control of the situation. I don't think anybody necessarily wants. I would agree with him.
Starting point is 00:07:19 It's just like, you know, come on Portland police, do it. But I see no evidence that Portland police are going to do it. Now, kind of in a related story, and this was an interesting story from X because Trump ended up holding that roundtable on Antifa yesterday. They're doing their things. And the way it was framed in the conventional cartel media, like you looked at like the UK Guardian, kind of a snooty place there, and what they said, this is how they framed it, White House gives platform to conservative influencers to air grievances during Antifa Roundtable. In other words, conservative reporters that aren't part of the Guardian or Oregonian or any other sort of thing like that, they're just not. supposed to be trusted, right? Well, Brandy Cruz, who is one of those conservative influencers of the undivided pot, said these reporters have been placing themselves at risk to raise
Starting point is 00:08:21 awareness on Antifa and the radical way that they operate. Brandy Cruz of undividing, I'm a reporter in Seattle, and frankly, I couldn't care less what any of you have to say about this meeting. We're not here for you. I'm not here to convince any of you that Antifa is a real thing, because if you haven't come to that conclusion by now, you're never going to come to that conclusion because you don't want to see it. And you're going to go out and you're going to say that it's a bunch of right-wing conservative influencers who are here spinning a tail. I was one of you.
Starting point is 00:08:54 Brandy continued, I was a mainstream reporter in Seattle for 10 years. I was a TV reporter on the streets doing my job, and I was assaulted, beaten up by Antifa. So it's not about being conservative. It's about people who go there and show what they're doing. And when I saw after all those years that the media wouldn't be honest about what was happening, that Democratic politicians wouldn't be honest about what was happening, I thought, well, gosh, if they're not being honest about that, maybe they're not being honest about President Trump either.
Starting point is 00:09:27 And it opened my mind to just looking at things for what they were. And now I find all you mainstream guys actually quite funny. And like I said, I'm much happier about it. But that's, you know, Brandy talking about that, testifying yesterday's meeting. That's good takeaway. And it just it. Cartel media here in Oregon is really not on this case. It's just not something.
Starting point is 00:09:50 It doesn't work. The narrative doesn't work. Okay. 20 minutes after six, we'll have to keep following that story, too. A week from now, town hall meeting on the ball field. On the Creekside Quarter development, on raising hotel motel taxes, or being allowed to do it, voters giving permission, should they do it? There is a hard push, a hard bunch of arm twisting going on here in southern Oregon.
Starting point is 00:10:21 And I think you're going to see most of our local media being very supportive of it. On the other hand, we'll tend to be more careful about this. Something tells me that Creekside Quarter is not inviting Fred Herman into their town hall. next week to say, you know, that ball stadium is the dumbest idea that I ever heard about and whoever came up with that in the city of Medford should be fired. You know, they're not interested in hearing that. They're got to paint the pie in the sky. Now, there is some potential good news and some potential bad news on this, too, and I'll share
Starting point is 00:10:54 some of this because I've been very critical for years about this attempt to hang a convention center or a conference center of some sort, even though we're always told it's needed. So I'll kind of go over kind of a reprise of what I had talked about a few years ago and found some new updates on what the convention and conference center business is looking like now. I'll tell you about that next. This is the Bill Meyer show. One of each K4 VIN 20292 MSRP 24-185. Telluride VIN 677258 MSRP 43 680, 3,000, 35909, do it's signing 10K miles per year, zero security deposit, all incentives and discounts to dealer plus tax title license 150 registration processing fee ends 1031.25. It's the fall trade-up at Kia Medford.
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Starting point is 00:13:26 I promised I would talk a little bit about this measure 15-238. This is going to be coming out. We're going to be voting on this over the next. Boy, talk about a hurry up election, hurry up special election. That'll be coming up November. We're going to be voting on this one. And it would allow the Medford City Council to raise the visitor tax. When people come and they go to a city of Medford area hotel, they pay a tax.
Starting point is 00:13:54 And it's like 11% right now. So it's a pretty high sales tax. It's essentially a hotel or a verbose sales. sales tax. It is a sales tax of some sort, right? They take that. And then it goes into the coffers and the travel Medford racket ends up getting a cut of that, you know, run by the chamber and all the rest of it. So chamber is all behind this. And I understand this is what the chamber is about. Critics could also say that the chamber is also getting about, is about taxpayers, you know, helping the good old boy network, you know, hang projects around the taxpayer's neck and, you know,
Starting point is 00:14:32 What is it, publicized costs, privatized profits, you know, that kind of thing. But, you know, this is not the, I'm going to say right now, this is not the absolute worst idea I've ever seen come out of this, except for the ball game, the ball stadium. I think Fred Herman is absolutely right, absolutely wrong location, too expensive, too compromised. And I don't think you have to spend $90 million to build an appropriate ball field for the Eugene Emeralds if you really want that here. And it'd be great to have, you know, people that like ball games, want to watch that, 68 days a year? No problem with this. It's a lot of money, though. And then, you know, about the time that the bond was over, then they, it would be just like the stadiums up in Portland, they'd be going to the taxpayers again.
Starting point is 00:15:17 It's just kind of my opinion about it anyway. But anyway, so Randy Sparicino, former mayor, of course, he's a Jackson County commissioner right now. He gets a letter to the editor into the road. Times. And he's painting a good, you know, a good story about this. Let me see if I could just get it up there. And he says, during my time as mayor, I'm just skipping around here, during my time as mayor, I was part of the effort that studied the feasibility of a conference center in Medford. The study confirmed what many of us already knew. Our community lacks the capacity to host large conferences and events that bring people, jobs, and revenue to the region. Measure 15
Starting point is 00:16:01 28. It's a crucial first step to finally making that conference center a reality by using the transient lodging tax funds that are paid by those staying overnight in Medford. The city has the opportunity to advance a project that has been years in the making while relying on visitor dollars rather than placing the costs on local residents. Okay, so that's where I was coming from. The part that I think kind of gets soft pedal with everybody pushing it, well, yeah, the subject, the survey that they did a few years ago also indicated that it didn't really pencil and that was my criticism
Starting point is 00:16:36 about the convention center business or the conference center business so I was wondering has that changed has that changed because earlier in the year now I got this from meetings today.com this is a corporate travel and business kind of website
Starting point is 00:16:56 In March, they were saying experts have a bullish outlook for 2025 corporate meetings. Corporate meetings segment has experienced an upheaval in the last five years due to massive disruptions to remote work. Perhaps that trends reversing, they're saying, inflation, an abrupt D-EIC change, younger generations entering, baby boomers exiting. but the global business travel association at this time was saying that they were really optimistic about corporate meetings and the future of conference centers, and they were bullish on this. And so they said that was something. This was in March that they were saying that. Well, about a month ago, an article came out at red branchmedia.com,
Starting point is 00:17:49 Marin Hogan, who is the CEO of Red Branch, and she's, like a corporate recruiter, HR, and she's all into these kind of things. Business travel trends 2025, why conference revenue is down 37% and we really don't want to be right. So she's writing about this, that how much she loves conferences, if budget and time weren't constraints, I'd probably go to one every month or something irreplaceable about the energy of in-person networking, the hallway conversations. And she's, she's right about that you know but at red branch media she says we are data driven in our approach to business decisions and the business travel trends we're seeing 2025 to 2026 is sobering
Starting point is 00:18:34 37 percent of business travel suppliers are expecting big revenue drops this year average drops around 17 to 18 percent less travel and revenue this is not a small dip she says. This is a significant contraction. It ripples through the entire conference and events ecosystem. Corporate cutbacks. About 29% of corporate travel buyers are anticipating slashing their business trips, 21 to 22%. And when you dig deeper, 27% of companies slashing travel spending by an average of 20%. These are not numbers on a spreadsheet. They represent empty conference seats and canceled registrations. And perhaps most telling is the industry mood she writes only 31 percent of business travel professionals remain optimistic about
Starting point is 00:19:27 the 20 to 25 uh 20 25 to 26 outlook that was a dramatic drop from 67 percent just months earlier that was the first report that i read you march they're all going happy oh we're finally out of covid we're going and we're going to be piling back in knee deep in gin and hookers and we're going to be going up to the i'm kidding about the gin and hookers maybe the gin but uh well maybe hookers in Vegas, right? Maybe not here in Medford. But still, six months ago, seven months ago, they were optimistic. The sentiment was, hey, man, we're going to be coming back, great guns, and now they're saying it's going to be down 30, 40 percent, and that it's already down 30, 40 percent. So this is the situation that I continued to bring up when the Medford City Council was trying to find
Starting point is 00:20:15 anything that they could throw along with the chamber and everyone else. They were throwing this, You know, if we keep throwing something, eventually the taxpayers will let something stick and we'll get our conference center. But when I talked about it a number of years ago when they first brought it up, and then the long-term trends were looking bad for conference centers, except if you are in an area like a Las Vegas or a Disneyland where you have so much going on besides just staying in there and looking at Crater Lake. And by the way, I love Southern Oregon. Don't get me wrong, I'm not bad-mouthing us.
Starting point is 00:20:54 But, you know, it's the same sort of situation where, you know, it's not like we're a Vegas. It's not like we're New York City. It's not like we're San Francisco where there are many, many, many, many other things to do. And this is one of the reasons why we live down here. I have no desire to live in a pinball machine or a city. lit up like a pinball machine like Las Vegas. We have a different style here. And there's
Starting point is 00:21:23 only so much attraction, I think, that going to see Crater Lake will bring. Now, I could be wrong about this, but this is why I've always been cautious about this whole idea of, hey, we get a business conference center in conference rooms and all of a sudden things are better.
Starting point is 00:21:40 And I know people couch it in community pride and all the rest of it, but it has to pencil. And when I'm seeing the latest numbers, even though seven months ago, they were going, hey, man, we're going to be back traveling, we're going to be in person, and now the reality is that they're not. And so we're talking about, hey, this is going to bring us the gravitas that we need here.
Starting point is 00:22:07 Maybe they're right. Maybe they're right. But the data for the business model is not healthy. That's all I'm saying. Okay. I said that five, six years ago, and it hasn't changed that much. And we're at the point where, you know, do you have to actually have a conference in the day of Zoom? Well, you put a Zoom call in and talk to your customers, that kind of thing. I know it's a lot more fun to get knee-deep in gin and hookers and come here, but I get that.
Starting point is 00:22:39 I understand the appeal of the conference, but they're expensive. And this is an expensive project, about a half billion dollars. that they're talking about and if 90% of the if 90% of the funding to do this half billion dollar project is going to be raised by the private sector by by investors with dogs in the fight why couldn't it be 100% has anybody asked that why does there have to be any taxpayer seed money in this of any sort given that this is a This is something that they're claiming is going to make so many billions of dollars over the years. You would think that private capital would be lining up.
Starting point is 00:23:25 That's why I'm just very careful, very careful about this push. All right. It's 634. This is the Bill Meyer show. You're on KMED and 993 KBXG, and I appreciate you waking up here. Do a quick home health check. Have you noticed sloping floors, sticking windows or doors that won't shut? If so, your home's foundation may need attention.
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Starting point is 00:31:31 Knowledge is power. A man trampled a memorial for Charlie Kirk. And this is where you power up. If you have differences, let's engage in dialogue. 1063, KMED. You're hearing the Bill Myers Show on 1063 KMED. Now Bill wants to hear from you. 541-770-5633.
Starting point is 00:31:52 That's 770 KMED. 642. Before the news break, I ended up mentioning how looking at the conference business world, it may be time to be cautious. And yet we, Medford voters, just a couple of weeks, are going to be voting on whether to allow the Medford City Council to raise hotel motel taxes in order to do a conference center, hotel room, or hotel, hotels, I should say, and conference rooms, conference center, that sort of thing, and $90 million ball field. and put that ball stadium over on on Hawthorne Park. And they're terming this a revitalization of Hawthorne Park. Now, we can have a little fun with this and say we're revitalizing it by right-sizing it,
Starting point is 00:32:50 making Hawthorne Park smaller, is that your idea of a revitalization of it? I mean, you know, how would you really like to see these parks as treated here in Southern Oregon? And I understand, and please understand, I am not anti-progress, I'm not anti-Metford growth and getting this, but I always want to be very careful about the proceeding with public, with the public-private partnership sort of thing, all right? And this is being sold to the people that the tourism, the tourists will be the ones that end up paying for this. But then I would also say if you're a verbo, if you have a vacation rental right now or you own a vacation home here in southern Oregon or you're someone who is a, has rooms to rent, et cetera, et cetera, this affects you too. An 11% rise to 13% rise is not a small tax increase, is it? At the same time, we're hoping to make Southern Oregon and Medford more attractive to people wanting to come here and stay here. We're going to make their hotel rooms even more expensive.
Starting point is 00:34:07 And the rooms in Southern Oregon are not cheap right now, at least in my experience, when people have come to visit. You know, the days of getting a hotel room, motel room for, you know, 25, 30 bucks a night, long, long gone. unless you've got the Roach Motel, you know, that kind of thing. But, you know, they're expensive. Everything's expensive, and then you put another 2% on it. In order to have this Hawthorne Park project, and I am very cautious, and I get the impression that the city of Medford is less cautious. Should we be cautious in this situation?
Starting point is 00:34:49 Would you think that this Hawthorne Park redevelopment, making it smaller, and then putting the ball field and putting this hotel. Is that a good thing? Is it overall going to work for you? Maybe this is the better question. I mean, I'm kind of thinking out loud with you this morning. Is it worth rolling the dice right now? Is it worth rolling the dice to raise the hotel motel taxes
Starting point is 00:35:15 under the assumption and grand hope that we'll be able to get this half billion dollar redevelopment? done. They paint a very, very good revenue picture here with this, you know, that it's going to be a lot of money. Billions of dollars. Let's see. A professional feasibility study estimates, this from Medford Alert, by the way, Medford Alert.com.
Starting point is 00:35:43 A professional feasibility study estimates that the conference center and hotel alone could generate $1.69 billion in total economic impact and 750,000. million dollars in local wages over time. And the supporter state this is a responsible and forward-thinking way to fund essential infrastructure and community development. Well, we're supposedly, we, the taxpayers, you know, our share of it, which is coming from the hotel motel tax. But remember, this is money paid that is essentially to be used by the public for public
Starting point is 00:36:20 purposes. It's not Travel Medsburg's money, although Travel Medford, I'm sure, likes to look at that. It's not the Chamber of Commerce's money, although, you know, they've got a dog in this fight. They go, you know, they're all plugged into this kind of thing. We've been down this road before, haven't we? And it's not the worst idea I've seen coming, but my question for you is that do you trust the city of Medford to roll the dice and let them raise those taxes? And you think that there wouldn't be any impact on people wanting to come here because our room has become even more expensive too. That's something else that doesn't really get talked about. Well, you know, you raise the hotel motel tax, no big deal. But every little bit hurts in an
Starting point is 00:37:04 inflationary time. And there's been a lot of inflation in that. But I'd be happy to take your call on that or anything else on your mind. Is it worth the risk? 7705-633-770K-M-M-E-D. And the one question which I would love to ask, in fact, maybe I can go to that town hall next week, is that if this project will live or die based on the taxpayers kicking in 10%, how big of a moneymaker is it really? You see where I'm coming from on this one? if 10% if 10% that the taxpayers
Starting point is 00:37:45 through hotel motel tax are kicking in supposedly this is called the seed money you know this is the seed money to make this happen if that makes all the difference and then 90% will come from the private sector why wouldn't the private sector
Starting point is 00:38:02 just pay the whole thing because the way I understand it they're going to own it aren't they they will own it hmm maybe I could get a public-private partnership to build me a new house if I only had to come up with 90% of it they could be my down payment
Starting point is 00:38:23 okay maybe that's how they're looking at it it's kind of like the down payment with the bank with the private equity funders you know that kind of thing 7705633 I think it is something that's really worth talking about I know some people may think this is in the weeds but we're going to be asked to vote on this in a very few days It's very quick and hurry up.
Starting point is 00:38:41 Hi, good morning. This is Bill. Who's this? Welcome. Hey, Bill, Steve and Mattford. Hey, Steve. How are you thinking about this one? So you're a city resident, so you've got a dog or a wild salmon in the fight, right?
Starting point is 00:38:52 Yeah, I don't think it's a great idea. And along the same line, I got my bill for the utility fees last month, and it went out five bucks. Well, if you signed up for paperless billing, they would. knock three dollars off, but the thing that they kind of snuck in there was they had raised the fee $2. Hmm. Now, did the, I haven't looked at by utility fee. Mine is on automatic pay, so I haven't looked at it for a little while.
Starting point is 00:39:25 You're messed up then. Oh, yeah? Because you didn't pay, yes. What? You didn't pay the amount they sent you. Why? That was on the bill, because they had a $3 fee if you, if you did. Didn't have, well, maybe you have paperless billing.
Starting point is 00:39:42 I don't know. Yeah, I do have paperless billing. They send me an email, you know, once a month. Okay. And then they bill it. Two dollars then. Okay. Here is, so did they say what went up, though?
Starting point is 00:39:54 Because remember, everyone here, everyone who's in the city of Medford right now is paying $60 a year to backfill the funding on the Rogue X. Now, remember, Rogue X was sold to the people under the guys that, well, wow. You know, the tourists are going to pay for it through the, you know, the car tax and the hotel motel tax. And, you know, when they go to that, I'm always a little bit suspicious because there was a bit of a bait and switch. They downplayed the side, well, we're going to refinance those ballpark bonds from the old U.S. cellular park. And then you schmows are going to pay it on your monthly utility and parks fee, which is what we do right now, which is what went up, though. Was it just the actual General Parks fee or something else going up? It really, I really didn't find it anywhere because I had been getting the paper bills.
Starting point is 00:40:48 And so I read what it said, and it said, you know, if you don't have paperless billing or charging you three bucks extra. And so I, but then I went and looked at how much I had been paying, and it was actually $5 higher. So there was $2 increase. Uh-huh. I didn't see anywhere where it said what that was for. Okay. I'll go take a look at the online building when I get off the show. I can't do it right now when I'm on because you've got to get logged in and it's two-factor authentication or something like that.
Starting point is 00:41:19 Yeah, yeah. They just sneak things in, you know, if you haven't been paying attention, or you've got on auto pay, you won't find out until you get a bill for the $2 for on your next bill. Yeah. But, you know, it's important that people understand that when it's, well, it'll just go in your utility bill, or it's just a little bit, or it's $5 a month. And that's the problem I had. I'm not saying that this is a Rogue X project. It's not. This is a much, much, much bigger project. It really is. And it looks like the goal is to have, you know, a whole lot of private money in this. But if 90%, if there willing to put up 90% obviously they see enough ability to make profit from this that why wouldn't they be willing to do the whole thing and then the only thing the city does is just uh hey we'll waive permitting costs or will waive maybe some systems development charges or something maybe that's you know i could see that being something rather than uh you know forking over
Starting point is 00:42:27 lots and lots of years of the uh you know of the hotel motel tax increase i don't know what do you Well, the whole thing doesn't make any sense to me. There's no parking. So anybody who's going to go, there's going to park in the mall parking lot, which means that the mall stores are not going to have parking. It just seems like something that I guess it's kind of the methods wanting to be, you know, kind of like Wrigley Field in New York or something. Oh, yeah. And I understand that. And I understand it. I'm not trying to just rain on everyone's parade every time they come up with something, but my point is, does it pencil? Can it pay for itself? And... And was it work? Yeah, and will it work? And the challenge that I thought that Medford has had for a long time, and I've said this many
Starting point is 00:43:19 times, and I'll continue to say it again, Southern Oregon is too large to be cute, but yet it's not large enough to have that gravitas, that, you know, that gravity pool of the huge investments in the big development type things, as you would, in a much larger city. That's all I'm getting at it. It's not that we're bad. It's just that we're a small to medium-sized city. And these are very expensive projects. We're small to medium-sized cities. And we have fog in the wintertime, and we have other issues, heat and things that don't make it particularly attractive. At certain times, I mean, we're about to get into the fog season. In fact, it looks like it's kind of trying to be foggy right now.
Starting point is 00:44:04 This is my favorite time of year, though, Steve. I have to tell you, I love falls in the southern Oregon. Really do. I do, too, except for the leaves raking part. Yeah, well, except for that. Fair enough. Hey, appreciate the call there, Wild Salmon. 655-7-70K-M-D.
Starting point is 00:44:18 we're talking about this Creekside Quarter, this Creekside Quarter project. And like I said, I don't want to rain on it. I don't want to be Debbie Downer on these kind of things. But it's going to be really careful. And they're always looking for a way to do a conference center. And yet the business doesn't look that great, at least from what I'm seeing. But hi, good morning, caller. Who's this?
Starting point is 00:44:38 What's your day? Hello. Good morning, sir. I didn't hear the static noise. Oh, hey, you were on. Brother Louis? No, this is Scott. Oh, hey, Scott. What's going on?
Starting point is 00:44:49 Well, so numerous things on the redo it. I mean, if they make Hawthorne Park smaller, they'll get rid of the homeless, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. They get to spend more money. But my questions are more along the lines of, so Rogue X was supposed to bring in millions of dollars for us by putting that in and taking that big chunk out of our, well, yeah, small chunk out of everybody's pocket. Yeah, out of our, yeah, 60 bucks a year, about 1,200 bucks by the time we're all done. We're all, every household paying about $1,200 for Rogue X. Correct. So now Rogue X is bringing in millions of dollars, according to that.
Starting point is 00:45:22 How much money has it actually brought in in the year or so that it's been there? Has it actually even broken even and paid for itself? I know there was a report done. I can't answer that without a little bit of research on this. But I did see a story in the Road Valley Times. It was crowing that supposedly it's doing really well, Scott. I don't know if anybody. I would find that hard to believe.
Starting point is 00:45:43 And if it's doing that well, why doesn't the profits from it go into helping fund this little 10% for us? I agree with you. I think the private investors ought to pay for all of it. Because if there are private investors already interested and they're thinking 90%, okay, you know. What's another 10? Yeah, what's another 10? Yeah. You know, if it is that valuable, if it is that valuable and potentially profitable, I would guess.
Starting point is 00:46:09 Right. And Rogue X is making a profit. Start kicking our five bucks a month back to us. for three or four years until we break even as well, and then we'll support the community even more. There's a possibility, though, that a so-called profit from Rugex, though, just goes into the Parks Department budget, or else maybe it goes to pay down the bond.
Starting point is 00:46:26 I don't know how their finances are constructed. So maybe it'll be like the City of Ashland Parks Department, where they were profitable for many, many, many years, and then Ashland said, hey, they've got money and brought them into the city, and now everybody here in Ashland has to pay five bucks a month on their utility bills, too, because the parks departments are broke. Yay. Isn't that great? Okay.
Starting point is 00:46:46 Yeah. We're everybody. Hey, Scott, I appreciate the take on it. You raised a couple of questions, and I'll see if there's anybody that could help us understand, you know, how that finance is structured here. But appreciate the call. Thanks, Scott. 657. You're on KMED. One of each K4 VIN, 20282 MSRP 24-185. Tel URIAD VIN 677-258 MSRP 43, 680,000,000-50-5-9-9-9-29-S-Signing, 10K miles per year. Zero security deposit, all incentives and discounts to dealer, plus tax, title, license, 150, registered. processing fee ends 1031.25. It's the fall trade-up at Kia Medford. During the Kia fall savings event, trade up to a new 20-25 Kia K4 LXS, only 159 a month,
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Starting point is 00:49:12 Oh, yeah, 993. The Grants Pass and Josephine County. All right, your calls continuing here. And like I said, this is a big deal that we're going to be asked to weigh in on here over the next few weeks, rather. It's very much a hurry up here with this November election deciding whether or not the city of Medford should be able to raise that hotel tax and do this half billion dollar development. And there is a lot on this. And remember, a week from now, town hall on this. And maybe, you know, we're coming up a lot of good questions, I think, like, why isn't Rogue X helping to pay for it?
Starting point is 00:49:52 Maybe it would be helping to pay for it in some respects. Maybe we don't know, you know, about that. You know, everything is about, you know, supposedly, you know, tourism is going to be it. Now, the problem that I still think that they're going to have selling this, though, is that when you have the premier baseball guy, Fred Herman, saying that it's a lousy stadium idea. I'm going to take him at that because I don't know how to build a baseball stadium, but Fred says, he'd love to have the Eugene Emeralds here. He said that last week, but says it, it's just a bad location. But yet they're kind of combining this all into one, one big project. But maybe we talk about that and more this morning. 7705-633-770K-M-E-D. Hey, there was a case in the courts that had a
Starting point is 00:50:38 decision. I'll tell you about when I get back afternoose that is very much akin to what state representative Dwayne Yonker was fighting getting the porno books out of the schools and the courts have weighed in on some of this. I'll share some of that coming up. We're here with Kevin.

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