Cordish & Mayor Jer: The Affair Sizzles

I saw Louisville’s First Lady this morning at the coffee shop. Surprisingly she didn’t look a bit beleaguered. Good for her. Strong woman, she.

My java mates and I conjectured she might want to be worried. Because it seems to us that something must going on with Hizzoner No Longer For Life and those bad boyz, the Cordishes. Got to be. Things are just way too cozy. Somebody’s got photos of somebody in flagrante delicto. Gotta be.

Let me see if my facts are correct?

The 16th Largest Metro Area in the nation, that would be the City of Greater Louisville Metro, or whatever unwieldy name we’ve actually got now, offered/ gave The Cordish Cos. a $1.8 million loan to lure some hot shot restaurant to the first floor of the Starks Building. One supposes in the space where Rodes resided for decades.

But Cordish didn’t do the deal. Nor, it appears, did they pay rent. They were evicted. Cute.

So they asked if they could then use this taxpayer $$$ — that’s right, kids, it’s our dollars they’re playing Monopoly with — to rehab the space that used to be Lucky Strike. May it RIP.

Jerry said “Sure.” Without, it appears, running it by the Metro Council, or whatever the Board of Alderman is called these daze.

Then, when word got out that maybe some of the moolah didn’t go to refurbish the Sports & Social Club, that maybe some of it landed in the expensive handbag of Paris Hilton, people started asking questions. Including other local retailers run out of business by the city-underwritten Cordish project. And — yes, it’s twu, it’s twu — our once great newspaper, the Courier-Journal.

So the city, attempting to prove it has a backbone despite all evidence to the contrary, mustered the courage to do the right thing. Yeah, it’s under some extreme heat here, but let’s not be cynical. They sent a letter to Cordish, asking for an accounting of the $950 large.

To which request, Cordish politely said, “No. That info is propiretary.”

Let me translate that response into simple English for you: “Fuck you. We ain’t tellin’ nothin’, capeche?”

(At this point, I must advise that I’m not reciting the plot to either “The Sopranos” or “The Wire.” The above scenario is public info, reported to be true.)

Can’t tell ya, say the Cordish folks. Ladies and gents, those folks got some cohones.

Yet, yet, yet — stay tuned for more — that’s not even the punchline.

Which is that Hizzoner No Longer For Life, Jerry Abramson — a fellow apparently shorn of his cohones — duly elected leader of our city, said yesterday (Friday) that he is satisfied with the Cordish response, that he is convinced the money was spent appropriately.

Really, Mr. Mayor, how you be knowin’ that?

And, here’s the final guffaw: There is apparently nary a provision in the loan agreement, which allows the city to demand a legal accounting of the funds.

It’s time for some fresh air in city government. And simply opening up the windows ain’t enough to clear out this stink.

We need a full and complete defenestration.