I remember fondly the spring of 2014, when we were upset over then-County Manager Gary Page’s prediction that the mall renovation and attached moves would cost $10 million over the course of a decade. I also remember a former commissioner telling me that the new county manager, Aaron Church, estimated closer to $20 million last fall. I was apoplectic.

Oh, how I long for those heady days! Now, on April 20, the “big reveal” showed the cost will now exceed $27 million. If you add the purchase price, it will well exceed $30 million. This is now couched as “good news.”

But, of course, that’s just fine because it “saves us $14 million!” How’s that? Well, the commission also engaged architects to produce a “not using the mall study” that comes in at $41 million. This ludicrous plan appears to have been drawn up as a much more expensive “straw man” alternative.  What do I mean? This “Cadillac plan” envisions building a Sheriff’s Office “super-building” next to the courthouse, replete with an $11 million parking deck and a $2 million sky bridge. Dump those two items and reduce the costs by $13 million and, all of a sudden, it’s not such a savings.

This reminds me of the story of young man who wanted his parents to buy him a new Chevrolet Camaro. After all, he was going to college and needed a dependable car, but he knew if he asked for a Camaro, he would probably get a dinky little Chevy Cobalt at best. After much pondering, he had a brilliant idea. Why not ask for a new Corvette and then settle for the Camaro and try to focus his parents on the savings created by his false compromise?

Like a true-false quiz, only two options are presented and we get to choose just one. There is no presentation of a “Chevy Cobalt” plan. The eventual plan also provides over 100,000 square feet more than the 15-year space needs study requires. This is wasteful to buy and renovate more than their own study says we need for 15 years from now.

It is easy enough to point out problems instead of offering solutions. Here is my solution. Tear down the mall. It’s well past its design life expectancy. Charlotte’s mall purchase boondoggle at Eastland is being razed at a cost of $800,000.00; ours should be much less. Put the new Knox Middle School on half of the land, as the school board is going to have to build this anyway and erect a new right-sized, energy-efficient Social Services building on the other half.

We can then leave the Health Department on Avalon to remain with the expensive dental clinic we built in there a few years ago. No one has provided any satisfactory reason as to why the Health Department and Social Services need to be in the same building as long as they are on the bus line. Elections, with three full-time employees, can go to the “paid for” building we already own on Mahaley, which is exactly where the Sides commission voted to put them before all this mall craziness happened.  Some elevator repairs and upgrades may be required. Veterans’ Service Offices, with two employees, should fit there as well. The Mahaley Building is right on a bus stop, mere blocks from the VA hospital. The theater at Jake can be retained and easily converted for department meeting spaces. Just put the seats back in and you have auditoriums.

Let everyone else stay where they are for now. The Health Department will have plenty of room to expand on Avalon and we can revisit the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office and courts expansion next to the courthouse in a few years, but without $14 million in parking decks and sky bridges.

While I am not an architect, I think we can do this plan (Knox construction excluded as funded under their budget) for less than $10 million. What is the difference? Try a 1-cent-per-$100 tax increase lasting 10 years, versus a 3-cents-per-$100 tax increase lasting 10 years.

Rowan has not yet economically recovered. Spending money like co-eds on spring break with Daddy’s gold card is not conservative, Republican or prudent. Neither is raising property taxes for the second year in a row. Let’s do this cheaply, if at all, and spend what money we can on schools and spec buildings to attract industry. Rowan taxpayers, many of whom are on fixed incomes, underemployed and unemployed, can’t afford to pay for this “taj-ma-mall,” no matter how much lipstick the commission puts on this pig.

Todd Paris lives in Salisbury.

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