Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, July 20, 1995                   TAG: 9507200027
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-11   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: RAY L. GARLAND
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Long

IT'S A VISION THING; YOU WOULDN'T UNDERSTAND

After nearly two years of visioning, the New Century Council, representing nine counties and five cities in the Roanoke and New River valleys and the Alleghany Highlands, is in the process of releasing its mammoth report. Some of the proposals seem straight from cuckooland.

It wants, for example, a monorail or magnetic-levitation train running from Roanoke to Radford, and high-speed rail service to Washington and Richmond. Never mind that rail-transit systems in areas with five times the population density count their losses in the hundreds of millions.

On a more practical level, the council hopes to create a system of industrial parks and a development corporation that would find seed capital for business expansion. With proper safeguards, there's nothing wrong with a multijurisdictional authority raising venture capital by selling tax-exempt bonds. But subsidies for corporations are also becoming a plague upon the land. Why, Newport News just committed $1.9 million to subsidize an airline.

When World War II ended 50 years ago, Virginia cities were in a strong position. How Roanoke, Richmond, Norfolk and some others got poor (or relatively so) while the counties around them got rich is a story too complex to tell here. But the short answer is the cities accepted the role the federal government designed for them as repositories of the needy.

Now alive to their plight, the cities struggle valiantly to find the magic lozenge that will turn retreat into advance. It isn't surprising to see them settle on the "star" project (or projects) that will demonstrate for all to see they're on the move again. My own view is different: Salvation more likely lies in controlling mundane costs. But that will require taxpayers to take on the public-worker lobby that exerts a disproportionate influence in city politics even as city employees themselves reside increasingly in the suburbs.

If the cities concentrate on getting the basics right, it is by no means unlikely that in a decade or so taxes in suburban counties will exceed those in the central cities. And those people seeking a low-cost environment will start coming back. We see signs of that already.

The real-estate tax in Richmond is second only to Petersburg at $1.45 per $100 of assessed value. But it has come down from $1.53 in 1989, and the tax breaks City Council is prepared to offer those renovating older properties will make it much more competitive with surrounding counties. Roanoke and Roanoke County are even closer, with a difference of only 10 cents in their tax rates on real property.

There's a simple explanation for this: Householders with lots of kids in school don't pay their way and never have. And as the counties have to invest in those infrastructure improvements the cities may have already, the noose of rising costs in suburbia may tighten further.

But the temptation is still there to seek the big project that will showcase a city on the move. Roanoke has spent millions to reopen Hotel Roanoke in the heart of downtown. This may break even, provided debt service is borne by others. Because the hotel was such a symbol of the city, I believe the risk was justified. Certainly, the designers did a superb job of converting an old landmark into a modern conference and convention center. But Roanoke is trying to promote more projects of this kind than it can possibly sustain.

Richmond has had less luck with its Sixth Street Marketplace, envisioned in the late '70s as the way to save the old heart of downtown shopping along Broad Street. The city has spent more than $30 million in tax dollars to keep it open, with no end in sight. Richmond is now assuming a $9 million loan that financed a portion of Valentine-Riverside a few blocks away.

This is the $22.5 million history theme park on the north bank of the James River that opened just over a year ago as the great hope of riverfront development. Plagued with losses that forced it to curtail operations, Valentine-Riverside will shut its doors after Labor Day to allow a new nonprofit organization to assume control. The city hopes to get its $9 million back and to avoid being on the hook for any portion of future operating deficits. It is entitled to hope.

Mayor Leonidas Young now wants to tear down the abandoned buildings between Broad and Grace that once housed Richmond's prestige department stores to make way for the Arthur Ashe Park that will showcase an African-American Sports Hall of Fame.

In some ways facing bigger problems than either Roanoke or Richmond, Norfolk marches to its own music. It manages to keep local taxes a bit lower than other large cities while tapping high-powered private citizens to get big civic projects done in record time. On every side their works are wondrous to behold: Waterside, the MacArthur Memorial, Nauticus, the Harrison Opera House, the Chrysler Museum and Harborside Stadium.

While it suffers at times from the big-eyes syndrome, Norfolk seems to handle its affairs with both more unity and dispatch. Cut off for years from the prospect of expanding its borders, Norfolk seems to have learned to maximize what it has, principally its superb and strategic location.

The "vision" thing is all right in moderation. But our older cities will work their way back not by shooting the moon but by doing routine housekeeping chores well. Only as relatively low-cost alternatives to the rising cost of living in the suburbs materialize will their story have a happy ending.

Ray L. Garland is a Roanoke Times columnist.