China-themed project in upstate NY draws critics

[SecularMotion]

Source: Register Star

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — It is an audacious plan that seems out of place for the Catskills: a $6 billion China-themed cultural, business and amusement park to be built on 2,200 acres of forest and former farmland nearly two hours from New York City.

China City of America has been pitched as a showcase for the country’s traditions, a boon for the distressed former Borscht Belt region and an opportunity for prosperous Chinese to invest $500,000 each through an immigration program that would grant them U.S. visas and a path to citizenship.

Local reaction was a mix of puzzlement and anger in the Sullivan County towns of Thompson and Mamakating.

“The take was, ‘Really?’ People were dumbfounded,” said Bill Rieber, the Thompson town supervisor. “It immediately generated a lot of opposition.”

Read more: http://www.registerstar.com/news/article_c406a5b2-8180-11e3-9172-001a4bcf887a.html

[In_The_Wind]

1. Why is this a bad thing ?

[paleotn]

7. Seeing as these Chinese business tycoons are in part responsible ....

...for taking well paying jobs from the industrial parts of this country, got rich off the deal, and now they want to, um, give something back? That's right, theme park, service jobs for the poor Americans! Well, that's more than the complicit American corporations want to give us. And what do the Chinese business tycoons get for such...generosity? Fast track visas followed by American citizenship! What a country!

[weissmam]

13. I don't they took anything

its the American people that wanted Walmart

[elzenmahn]

24. It's also the American People...

...who in greater numbers by the year, can't afford anything that comes out of anyplace except Walmart.

Personally, I think we can do without this oversized propaganda tool for the Chinese government on our soil.

[cali]

18. Oh, I can tell you exactly why it's a bad thing. It's a scam.

It's purchasing a green card. we up here in northern vermont are watching this same scam in the form of the Jay Peak/Newport Vermont project. the jobs have been low paying and seasonal. the construction at Jay is evidently unbelievably bad. the people getting rich are cronies of the guy who instigated all this. It's a pyramid scheme being touted by my governor and Pat Leahy and bernie and it will freaking crash- probably within the next year.

EB-5. It's a scam.

[In_The_Wind]

22. I knew someone would come up with a good answer.

"It's a scam" sounds about right to me.

[cali]

26. `thanks. I'm really convinced that this will be a big scandal within a year

there's already been quite a bit about the fraud within the EB-5 program, but specifically I think the Jay Peak project will be a big national scandal. If not the largest of the EB-5 projects, it's one of them.

Here's an article from the NYT about the project:

JAY, Vt. — At this remote outpost by the Canadian border, Bill Stenger is overseeing what he says is the biggest economic development project that Vermont has ever seen.

He is expanding the Jay Peak ski resort, which he co-owns, but he is also building a biomedical research firm and a window manufacturing plant, extending the runway at the local airport and rehabilitating much of the nearby town of Newport, where he lives. There, he is developing the waterfront, adding the town’s first hotel and a conference center and rebuilding an entire downtown block. He is also creating what he says is the largest indoor mountain bike park in the world and a state-of-the art tennis center.

The price tag for the entire project, which Mr. Stenger says will create 10,000 direct and indirect jobs over several years, is $865 million.

But even more unusual than the size of the undertaking is the method by which Mr. Stenger and his business partner, Ariel Quiros, are financing it. They have tapped into a federal program that gives green cards, or permanent residency, to foreigners who invest at least $500,000 in an American business — the reward for the investment is a chance at United States citizenship.

<snip>

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/31/us/31vermont.html

[Lasher]

23. Good question, good answer.

It is fundamentally unfair for people to be able to buy their way to the front of the line to get LPR status. OK, I'm a big boy and I know that sort of thing goes on all the time in different forms. But scorn is justified in this case because they're being so blatant about it.

[cali]

28. indeed they are blatant

about it. The whole Jay project is just ludicrous. the promise of 10,000 jobs in a town of 5,000? crazy. Hi tech companies making artificial organs in the backwoods of Vermont? Yeah, sure. It's beginning to remind me of a Steven King novel or Gerald Bull's insane Space Research Corporation (a couple of miles from Jay) of a generation ago. Something about the Northeast Kingdom makes it fertile ground for crazy shit- bad and good.

<snip>

“There’s a level of nervousness — watching Bill spend money is like watching my grandson spend Monopoly money,” said Chris Braithwaite, the publisher of the local newspaper, The Barton Chronicle. “But Bill has been here a long time and has a real commitment to this community.”

Some residents are already being confronted with new realities. At the Family Recipe, a small restaurant on Main Street, Carol Bonneau, 50, the owner, said she felt as if the rug was pulled out from under her when she learned that her business — and the entire block on which it sits — would be razed. She said she was losing her investment and had no idea where she would go.

Mr. Stenger said he planned to talk with everyone who would be dislocated and help them find new opportunities. As for how to make his projects sustainable, he said they would draw visitors, including thousands of Canadians from just over the border, by their quality.

<snip>

Mr. Stenger dismissed criticism that the visa program simply allowed rich people to jump ahead of others in line for citizenship.

<snip>

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/31/us/31vermont.html?pagewanted=2

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Research_Corporation


In any case, it's about a lot more than just this one project, but this is the largest project of its kind and its been championed by so many big name liberals like Leahy, Shumlin and Sanders.

[DBoon]

30. "making artificial organs in the backwoods of Vermont"

Not so much Steven King as HP Lovecraft

If they try to reanimate the newly dead, watch out

[hedgehog]

38. It will totally change the nature of a semi-rural area.

[dorkzilla]

2. It's one of a growing number of EB5 visa projects.

I have family members that are involved in organizing similar (not theme parks but legitimate businesses in the rust belt). Chinese nationals seem to be the most keen to get involved. The economy in upstate NY has been pretty screwed since the end of the Civil War. My brother lives about 40 miles north of Albany and there are scads of abandoned houses and shuttered factories everywhere. Plus the real estate is cheap as chips (6 bedroom Victorian house for $20k anyone?) so I'm sure whoever is sponsoring this is making out like a bandit.

I'm sure if it was less "Chinese" you wouldn't have heard a peep out of the locals.

[Bohunk68]

4. I sense that you are saying that it is a racist

reaction to the Chinese creating a park? I know of many green activists that are not exactly thrilled either. I guess the Catskills should also welcome fracking and not worry that a huge theme park may suck up a lot of precious groundwater. I live in Schoharie County and the Sharon Springs area has been gradually coming back as a tourist place to go. There are several large old wooden hotels that are vacant and waiting for investors. Well, some came. Some were Chinese, some were Korean. Promises up the wazoo about what they would do for the area, IF ONLY they would get tax free for 20 years, and huge government backed loans and giveaways. Show me the jobs that they have brought.

[dorkzilla]

6. Well, yes I guess so...

If they will brook less opposition over fracking than a Chinese theme park I think that's proof enough that may be the case for some.

Cuomo was pushing hard to make upstate ny the "Greek yogurt-making capital of the world" a few years back. Such rich, wonderful soil for farming, so many empty farms for small livestock operations for dairy farmers...I don't know why this is so difficult. Start by going to the graduating classes at Cornell and CIA in Hyde Park and giving students 10 year tax breaks and other incentives to start sustainable farming and organic dairies. Betcha you'd have more than a few takers, and this may dissuade BigAg from muscling their way in.

[Bohunk68]

9. Yes Cuomo did push for that,

and yes, it is happening or getting there. There is an already large presence in Upstate for greek yogurt production. Having my degree from SUNY-Cobleskill, which is an Ag/Tech college, I understand fully what you are saying about the tax breaks for students. That is already a part of the programs according to several of the students. Many of the ag students are already from family farm backgrounds and will be returning to the family farms after graduation.

[dorkzilla]

10. Encouraging news!

Here I thought I was having an original thought

[cosmicone]

14. Students are more likely to be lured

by writing off student loans than tax breaks.

[dorkzilla]

15. How about both?

They give a ton of all sorts of tax breaks to corporations, isn't it time we started giving just a few to our citizenry?

[cosmicone]

40. I'd be all for that. n/t

[weissmam]

12. Do you want thme noty to try?

Its a depressed area , there has to be an incentive

Plus I have a feeling that if was anything other then asian there wouldn't be a peep

[dorkzilla]

20. I said exactly that in my post.

See that part where I said "I'm sure if it was less "Chinese" you wouldn't have heard a peep out of the locals." ??

[Bohunk68]

41. Sullivan County is far from being a depressed area.

It became NYC's other bedroom after 9-11 when many upwardly mobile people moved there. You want to talk depressed area, go further north to my area of the Catskills.

[KurtNYC]

16. "Screwed since the end of the Civil War." (?!) Those big Victorian houses were built AFTER the Civil

War. Saratoga Racetrack started during the war and is now the oldest continuously operating sports facility in the country. There was a boom here after the Civil War fueled by the railroads and access to NYC.

Lately people who invest big dollars lose big dollars ($1.4 million lost in 16 months):
http://gossipsofrivertown.blogspot.com/2014/01/ear-to-ground_13.html

Let the Chinese spend some money here.

[dorkzilla]

19. Yes I know that but...

After the Civil War the people that generally did agricultural work left their farms and headed off to urban areas for work; industrialism beckoned and it was less grueling than farm work. It got really bad after the Great War. Saratoga also is not representative of the upstate region--all you have to do is look at real estate prices in Saratoga versus another town nearby, like Gloversville, and you'll see that it still holds true.

Also, the point I was making was that the area DESPERATELY needs jobs and infrastructure.

[snooper2]

29. Gloversville 170 properties from 30K to 1.5 million

FYI

http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-search/Gloversville_NY/type-single-family-home

[dorkzilla]

31. And the real estate in Saratoga is $56k for a trailer and $4.5mil

Also by your own link the cheapest home in Gloversville is $11k.

There are 4 pages of homes in Saratoga over $1mil and only 1 property in Gloversville for $1.5…and I'm not sure why they listed a mid-1970's cape on 6 acres that high.

http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-search/Saratoga-Springs_NY/beds-3/pg-33

[snooper2]

33. I wouldn't call that house for 11k a "house" - it needs to be razed LOL

built in 1838


All of it is too expensive to me anyway...I would have to drive three hours to our nearest office

Check out this short sale I found this weekend. Too bad it'll be another year till we are ready to sell our existing house-


$125K
4Bed 3Bath

http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/3401-Fontaine-St_Plano_TX_75075_M76931-76159?row=10

[dorkzilla]

36. I'm in the same boat!

I LOVE my house but I'm going to have my dad move in with us and our house is just a wee bit too small. There are some amazing homes on the market in the town I want to move back to (Tarrytown, NY) but I won't be in a position to do so for 18 months. Plus my current mortgage is at almost 7% but I haven't had enough income to get approved for a refi…oh well, sometimes you're the bug, sometimes you're the windshield!!

[Herself]

3. China is loyal to China

American jobs may be contractual initially, but the lifespan of that mandate will probably have a sundown date. As with BMW, they were required to hire full time workers with benefits. The sundown date came, the full time perm workers were purged, now it's temp hiring, grueling hours, WTW state thumbs it's nose at OSHA & Labor laws with state wink/nod support. Repetitive injuries squashed, worker related injuries squashed, unemployment levels down because injured workers can't work, fraud if you apply for unemployment injured, so you turn to social safety nets that are the tea party fave source for re-allocation of funds to the military/war industry.

It's a carrot you see dangling. I'd test that carrot for the synthetic's inside it.

If you don't stand for your state and for your interests, you can reap the same as W. Va is reaping in their corporate polluted state and corp protected from liability state.

[Bohunk68]

5. Right on!!!!

thank you.

[dorkzilla]

8. Wow...

Horrible story but I'm not surprised. I will share this with my family that are involved in this. Of course they were approached by local officials to help attract business; I assume they're the same politicians that wink/nod to the labor violations.

[adirondacker]

11. 21st Century Walley World!

[JackInGreen]

17. Are they going to

import that density of smog for accuracy?

[Nanjing to Seoul]

21. Sullivan County. I grew up in Bethel, just north of Mamakating

These people would oppose everything.

I see the hillbillies I grew up around are still as stupid and short sighted as they were when i left to move to Arizona in 1997

What I also find reprehensible is, living in China and married to a Chinese woman, that my wife reads this website and sees all the anti-China and anti-Chinese comments and asks me why Americans hate her so much?

If you knew the mindset and the culture, you'd understand where that question comes from.

[elzenmahn]

25. It's not your wife I (and hopefully, other sane people) have the issues with...

...it's the Chinese GOVERNMENT, and the American Government's kowtowing to the Chinese GOVERNMENT that I have an issue with.

[Nanjing to Seoul]

27. To the run of the mill Chinese, they see "China" and "the Chinese"

and the ingrained insecurity comes out. They do not differentiate between it because their language does not have that.

I am 外国人 (wai guo ren) from the country 外国. . .meaning all foreigners are the same.

I would hope people would understand that international eyes read this website and that I am getting tired of explaining to my wife that Americans don't hate her, even though she reads alot of anti-Chinese comments on here.

Some have even brought her to tears.

[Dopers_Greed]

32. Have the Chinese people that think Americans hate them...

Been told that it's the China's "anything goes" policy toward destroying the environment, violating human rights, capitalism powered by slave labor, corruption, etc. that drives the anti-China comments?

My first thought when I saw this link on the DU homepage was "Great, is this 'project' going to be a factory built out of leaking drums of toxic waste that spits out smog?"

[mainer]

35. These are private investors, not the Chinese government

Would you say the same for investors from any other country? That they want to turn the US into a stinking pit of smog? Or is it just the Chinese you say this about, even though the woman heading the project has been in the US for 23 years? Isn't she an American now, or do the Chinese never get to call themselves American?

[Nanjing to Seoul]

43. So you are saying that my wife should accept the anti-Chinese venom because of

policies she is incapable of changing?

When I go up to her hometown for Chinese New Year, I'll be sure to tell her that Americans hate her because of her government and because she's Chinese, she's just as guilty.

[mainer]

34. No Chinese government funds in the project, the article says

I suspect the money's coming from wealthy Chinese investors who are trying to get AWAY from the Chinese government.

I find it blatantly racist that so many people assume it's an "evil Chinese government" takeover of America. If you look at the demographics of upstate NY, you'll find quite a few Chinese in the Ithaca area, many drawn there by Cornell University. You'll also find many wealthy Chinese (in China) who are desperate for wholesome, organic dairy products who can't rely on corrupt farms in China. I know several NY dairy farmers who are talking to Chinese companies about shipping powdered milk products to China. Since dairy farmers are struggling in the US, it would be a big boon to them.

[geek tragedy]

37. We can't bring your jobs back from China, but you can pretend to visit them

in this new amusement park.

[hedgehog]

39. To reiterate what I said above - if it suceeds, it would cause a bubble in housing prices,

probably pricing a lot of locals out of the market- as in some formerly rural areas of New England which became sites for second homes.


We in Upstate New York don't need monster projects, we need a bunch of small plants which give us some resilience.

[adirondacker]

44. Revitilizing downtown areas that were/are destroyed by the likes of Walmart/Home Depot/Lowes would

be a good start. I agree 100% with what you are stating. I have no problem with bringing culture into the area, but this is not the way to go about it.

[hedgehog]

46. Exactly! We don't want to burn down the village in order to save it!

[YOHABLO]

42. build a high speed train from the area directly to NYC .. just a thought

[hedgehog]

45. Just run the trains more often from Buffalo to Albany - and restore the

lines into the Adirondacks!

I can take a train from Syracuse to Buffalo in the morning, but the last time I checked, there was no way (bus or rail) to return that same evening.

Also - we need some means of transportation once you arrive at the destination - rental cars or buses or whatever!