Category Archives: News

To lease or not to lease city vehicles

Larry’s currently suggesting that the city of Birmingham lease vehicles to replace the current city fleet of 2,200, presumably saving the city money over the life of the 3 year lease agreements. He’s recommending that the city tap into its reserve fund (to the tune of about $2.9 million) to cover a portion of the costs associated.

If he hopes to be successful with this proposal, he needs for it to be approved soon, especially considering that signals are coming from the Big 3 U.S. auto makers that the lease ride may be ending (if not at least harder to pull off) directly through them from now on. Plus, there are some concerns from city councilors about tapping into the reserve fund for vehicles (which has probably increased after hearing that the $4 million shortfall that the BJCTA said existed was now actually closer to $7.4 million).

UPDATE: Sewer debt crises are never dull

Where are we now? Retirement Systems of Alabama‘s David Bronner made front page news yesterday when he said that they’d be interested in purchasing Jefferson County’s sewer system for $1.2 billion – of the $3.2 billion in debt owed – provided that the county declare bankruptcy first so that the creditors could battle over how they’d get repaid. So of course someone representing the county fired back that it was an irresponsible plan. Which was followed by yet another response by Bronner saying the plans to raise fees and charges was the irresponsible solution. This condensed version doesn’t even take the politics into consideration.

The soap opera should end soon. The next payment is due in early August.

FYI – We knew that the headline was misspelled. We were waiting for someone to comment to give away a t-shirt, but the person who did decided to not give a real email address. Oh well, there’s always next time…

Signature projects downtown take shape

Model of Railroad Park structures. Special to bhamterminal.com

Special to bhamterminal.com

Today’s ONB Breakfast Briefing focused on the current status of three projects considered by many to be signature statements for Birmingham, including the Railroad Park and the Marriott Renaissance Hotel to be located in the former Regions Bank headquarters. Click on the image above to view more images from the presentation.

Continue reading

Langford profiled on NPR

We figured that many people may not have heard the NPR profile of Birmingham’s mayor filed by WBHM’s own Tanya Ott. It aired during Saturday’s broadcast of All Things Considered and takes a look at how the ride’s going so far. It definitely not the first time he’s been the focus of national media; he’s also been interviewed recently by the CBS Evening News about his four day work week program.

An extra day off for Birmingham’s librarians

Thanks to our friends at the Birmingham Public Library for forwarding this over to us. Mayor Langford has instructed all City departments and as a result, ALL locations in the city library system will now be closed tomorrow and Friday, resuming their regular schedules on Saturday (so if you were planning on grabbing some books or videos, today would be the day). It will be the first time that the library is not operating during regular business hours on July 3.

More airport traffic? Maybe, but for the wrong reasons…

I got an email today from the chairman of the Business Travel Coalition directing me to the Save my Airport! website they’ve established to raise awareness about the potential of an airline crisis due to rising fuel prices. The consumer advocacy group has compiled two lists on the site highlighting airports that may lead to a reduction or suspension of service. Interestingly, most of our major large city and regional airports made the list. That would include ours (currently in the news for a completely unrelated reason) and Huntsville‘s.

Dothan and Mobile and Montgomery are the ones included on the regional airport list. Reduction in service from these cities may boost our numbers here, but for the wrong reasons. If you feel compelled to voice your concern to the appropriate elected officials, they’ve made it easy to do that as well – just enter your zip code on this page to get started.

Van fire on Morris Avenue

Van fire under control on Morris Avenue Birmingham, AL - Trav Bryant

Trav Bryant/The Terminal

A ford mini van is on fire between 21st and 22nd Streets North on Morris Avenue. Morris is closed between those two streets.