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South Bend Redevelopment Commission <br />Rescheduled Regular Meeting -June 25, 2008 <br />6. NEW BUSINESS (CONT.) <br />A. Public Hearing <br />(1) continued... <br />money if put to some other use, but does that <br />really define them as blighted? I understand <br />the need for growth and the need for <br />development. It seems to me what's really <br />desperately needed is manufacturing growth <br />and technology. I don't understand why <br />we're proposing another set of distribution <br />centers and offices and medical buildings and <br />service, retail facilities. There's been a lot of <br />talk about how this project will raise $49M, I <br />think you all caught the fact that it's <br />assuming that it ever builds out. It's been <br />however many years and there's one building <br />in there. Do we really believe it's going to <br />build out and we're going to see those <br />revenues? If you look at Blackthorn and how <br />businesses have moved from one phase to <br />another and then when abatements have <br />expired, have left. You've got to ask <br />yourself why we wouldn't see the same <br />pattern here. As a matter of fact, it's all part <br />of an even bigger picture, it seems to me. The <br />businesses left downtown South Bend to go <br />to Blackthorn in the first place, then moved <br />through its phases, and then are either still <br />there or have already moved on. Whenever <br />you create a new thing, you really have to <br />look at what will the market bear. When <br />University Park Mall became successful, <br />North Village Mall almost immediately dried <br />up and died. It struggled and struggled and <br />died. Scottscale, of course, has now gone <br />through its agonies. One of two things will <br />happen when you put in Portage Prairie, <br />either University Park Mall starts to die, or <br />because it's already thriving, doing so well, <br />21 <br />