Tic-Tac-Toe With God (FICTOID)
Congressman Adler wanted the Baker and 45th block for a lobbyist.
The lobbyist funneled together a couple of hundred thousand dollars in small donations filtered through holding companies to escape election campaign scrutiny, but ultimately they all came from a single donor who wanted the block for a big megacomplex.
The problem was the small cathedral on the corner.
Built over a century earlier, its congregation steadily declined over the decades.
Now it was run by a virtual skeleton crew of clergy and volunteers, the building slowly falling into disrepair.
But they owned the property they sat on, and Congressman Adler needed it for the megacomplex.
Eminent domain could be wielded against individuals and small businesses, but not against churches, not unless one wanted to incur the wrath of God in the form of hundreds of thousands of angry voters.
Congressman Adler didn’t want that.
He tried to good old fashion American method of flat out buying off the cathedral, but the clergy and congregation declined to sell.
The cathedral was theirs, they felt entitled to the comfort and assurance it provided.
Congressman Adler’s next step was to get other establishments on the block to sell out, allowing him to leave the cathedral a pathetic island on a sea of urban decay.
He got one business at the far end of the block to capitulate.
The cathedral sought out the family of a recently deceased owner of another business and got them to donate their property to the church in exchange for a hefty tax write off.
Congressman Adler felt offended that mere citizens dared employ the tactics he felt exclusively reserved for politicians and billionaires.
He responded by siccing the health department on a family restaurant on the other side of the block, forcing them to close down and acquiring the property for his secretive donor.
In turn, the cathedral rented an empty store and turned it into a day care center, attracting working parents who joined the congregation.
Congressman Adler grew irritated at this big game of urban tic-tac-toe he played against the cathedral. Using a guy who knew a guy who knew a guy, he sent arsonists to burn down an abandoned building on the block.
The cathedral responded by petitioning the city for a 99-year lease on the burned out lot that they would transform into an organic garden to feed area homeless.
By now a jagged zigzag pattern dominated property rights on the block, with neither the congressman nor the cathedral securing a straight, unbroken line.
If the cathedral’s property all lay on one side of the block, the secretive donor could simply scale down his megacomplex, but instead it now presented a hodgepodge of holdings that couldn’t be transformed into anything the donor found profitable.
Frustrated at Congressman Adler, the donor dumped a ton of cash into his opponent’s campaign and got him voted out of office at the next election.
Congressman Adler lost by not winning.
The cathedral won by not losing.
There’s a lesson to be learned there…
© Buzz Dixon
