Those mean, stingy county officials just wouldn't go along, and the mayor is sad, so unbearably sad:
"The dream of a joint solution to Fort Wayne's and Allen County's space needs through co-location just died,” a somber Mayor Tom Henry said in a hastily arranged news conference Thursday afternoon.
But who killed it? City and county officials identified vastly different culprits.
Well, he should be somber, and more than a little embarrassed. As County Councilman Paul Moss notes, the city and county are already co-located and have been for a long time. Mayor Henry is the one who used a simple, specific need -- for new police headquarters -- as the excuse to rush into purchase of Renaissance Square and to pressure the county into coming up with the money to help fix up the building and move all city and county offices around sufficiently for taxpayers to not know where to go for what.
At least County Council members, right now the only political body in the county worthy of being described as fiscally responsible, had the sense to say, unanimously "Are you nuts?" and refuse to commit the money. So now the city is stuck with the $14 million tab for purchase and renovation of Renaissance, which will become City Hall, and the City-County Building will become strictly a county operation.
Who killed the dream? That is the most unnecessary question of the year.
