by Dogpatch 6 Replies latest jw friends
Check out the "nice" article by the Brooklyn Eagle a couple of weeks ago at:
http://www.watchtowernews.org/moveprinting.htm
How long before they have to sell the Brooklyn plant, or will they move the Patterson people there just for punishment? :-))
Randy Watters
Watchtower News
Thanks for the post and tip. Too bad the newspaper isn't online.
Blondie
Thanks, Randy. Was that the complete article? I ask only because it appears that the final punctuation mark was a comma. Some bytes from the story:
there are about 3,100 workersat Bethel
each year, Bethel gets about 60,000 visitors
The WTB&TS owns more than 35 buildings:warehouses, offices, residences, libraries, the historic Bossert Hotel, and a million-square-foot shipping facility on the Furman Street waterfront.
The move, scheduled for completion by spring of 2004, will empty 600.000 square feet of prime DUMBO (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass) real estate, spread between four buildings and potentially displace 500 volunteer workers.
Almost all New York State property owned by religious organizations, including the Watchtower, is tax exempt.
Because the property is tax exempt, the WTS can continue to hold empty, non-productive office, warehouse and residential space in Brooklyn with no cost of doing so. A tax-paying enterprise would have to ask themselves if keeping empty non-productive real estate was "worth it." Not so the WTB&TS.
Is the WTS concerned about how their leaving Brooklyn will affect their former neighbors. Of course not; they're all bird food, condemned to die at Armageddon, which is due any day now.
I expect that once the Society is gone from the area there will be a virtually block-party atmosphere for a while among the residents, then the vacant buildings will begin to work their magic and result in a local depression and other problems.
As I understand it, the Furman St. building is for sale. I have been unable to locate a market asking price on the property, but would be interested in what kind of figure that they expect from selling the improved property. I know that they purchased it at a below market value price when they aquired it.
Anyone who knows how to access this info, I'd be grateful if you could post some of it.
Coon.
The whole area is experiencing a renaissance and their property holdings in Columbia Heights are now very valuable--especially because they have kept them in such fine condition.
There is a lot of development and rehabbing going on right now, and the Society is looking to cash in.
Wouldn't the profit they make on the sale be taxable?
Coon Dawg,
Information on 360 Furman:
http://www.uspdr.com/consumer/aw-commercialdisplay.asp?unikey=6100020030000024500120000000
To research (by county or all at once if you have dsl) all 57 pieces of property the Watchtower Society owns in the State of NY, go HERE.
