Thank Goodness, Great Pizza in the Neighborhood.

At the end of a really obnoxious day (don't even ask), at 7:00, I was coming home to no food.  It occurred to me that someone had mentioned the newest incarnation of "My Pizzeria" at 653 NE 125th Street, and I had an idea whoever it was said it was good.  So I thought I'd give it a try, and myself a break.

The owners are a married couple, Leandro DeVita and Dana Lulic.  Dana was there, and she told me they had owned DeVita at about 70th and Biscayne for 10 years, until they sold it this past January.  They brought their show to My Pizzeria, and they've now been open one month.  They outfit it and create ambiance like it's high class food.  In fact, pizza is not the only dish they serve.  They have about four Italian dishes, and the usual accompaniments.  They don't call the place My Pizzeria, either.  It says that on the outside, but they call themselves Tomato & Basil.  Dana says they specialize in fresh, high quality ingredients.

My thought was to get myself a pizza, then go home to console myself, and eat my pizza there.  Alone.  But the more I stood around waiting, the more I got to talking to Dana, it occurred to me it might be nicer to add a salad to my order, and just eat there.  Dana was very pleased to host me.  I was the only eat-in patron.  She made up the table, brought me a cruet of olive oil, and a flask of water, and I waited.  The salad came soon enough.

I don't know if Caesar salad is worth $10.  My reflex is to say no lettuce salad is worth $10.  But it tasted amazingly good, and it would have been enough to share, except consoling myself meant, among other things, eating the whole thing.  The two slices of very lightly toasted baguette, to which I added the olive oil, were perfect.  So was the cheese, and so were the croutons in the salad.  The dressing was a bit thicker than it needed to be, but it made a great salad.  I have absolutely no complaints.

I ordered the vegetarian pizza.  This is most unusual vegetarian pizza.  The crust is thin, and it was not dry in the center.  But what a taste!  I would love to know what recipe they use for that dough.  The "sauce" is really just plain tomatoes: San Marzano tomatoes.  These people don't fool around.  And if you think you need anything more than great San Marzano tomatoes to make a magnificent-tasting pizza sauce, let me tell you, you don't.  The topping was unbelievably good.  It was fresh spinach, which tasted better than spinach usually does, lots of thin-sliced eggplant, red bell pepper slices, and spectacular thickish slices of garlic.  Wow, what garlic.  Dana started to tell me what was special about the mozzarella cheese, but she stopped.  She acted like she was distracted, but I really thought she didn't want to reveal some secret.  The cheese was not heavy on the pizza, and it tasted perfect.  There's definitely some story about that cheese.

Every night, Monday through Saturday, there is some special offer.  Mondays, it's $4 beer.  Tuesdays, it's $4 champagne for the ladies. Wednesdays, it's half price wine, and Thursdays, it's all you can eat pizza for $15.  I still haven't gotten over the loss of Slices, so I'm there some Thursday soon.  Friday is all you can drink prosecco for $15, and I forgot what Saturday's special offer is.

Mama Jennie's is OK.  So is Steve's.  Mario's is not great.  Tomato & Basil is the place to go if you want great pizza, right here in the neighborhood.  The food is amazing, the ambiance is extremely engaging (each table has a vase of rosemary sprigs, from which Dana cut a small amount for preparation of something), and the proprietor couldn't be more inviting.  And not that it matters, but she's a knockout.  I didn't get to see Leandro.  My guess is he's a knockout, too.

Do yourself a favor.  Don't miss Tomato & Basil.  You'll find it where the sign says My Pizzeria.

Photogs Needed!

Greetings All!

Several months ago when the proposed assessment fee was being discussed, we had a representative from Craig A. Smith come to our monthly meeting (April) to explain the “plan” and to answer some questions.

In short, there were two points that stuck out in my mind. First, that he had little factual data regarding our situation and as such, was somewhat at a loss regarding specific recommendations. Further, he stated and I will paraphrase as best as I can remember, “if you do not have standing water after 12 hours, then you do not have a flooding problem. We live in South Florida, etc.”

With this in mind, I have been waiting to hear from our Staff as to when our existing storm water drains would be cleaned out before reaching out to you regarding this request. This has now been completed.

What we are trying to do is find a couple of residents who are willing to take “before-and-after” time stamped pictures of areas, (close to each) where standing water is perceived to be a problem. Preferably, we want to gather photos spanning a 12 hour interval… or as close to this as possible. This grass root sweat equity approach may provide the data necessary to determine what, and if any real flooding problems exist… and where. Since storm water flooding is not a Village wide issue, this should help to determine and isolate the areas where water remains after a 12 hour period.

So, at this point we have 2 residents that have signed on. A couple more would be helpful and provide a better overall Village wide analysis.  If any of your reading this live close to an area where standing water occurs and would be willing to gather photographic records, your efforts would be appreciated.

Please contact me via email and we can discuss this further.

Thanks in advance,

Milton Hunter

miltonhunter@gmail.com

 

I'm Taking Two Polls. Please "Vote" By Leaving a Comment.

One of my friends who's a Village resident points out that the new building where Village offices will be should not be called the "annex."  It should be called Village Hall.  The other building, the "log cabin," should be called the log cabin.  What we've lapsed into doing until now is calling the log cabin the log cabin or implying that it's Village Hall, and calling the new building the annex.  Your thoughts?

Joe Chao had the idea of rezoning all of 6th Avenue in the Park, so that it could be used for commercial purposes.  Joe teaches martial arts, and his house is sort of on 6th Avenue.  It's actually on Griffing, with just a little piece of Griffing Park between him and 6th Avenue.  If he could, he might like to have a martial arts studio in his home.  When he raised the idea in a comment in this blog, Chuck Ross agreed that it might be an interesting idea to convert 6th Avenue in the Park to the equivalent of NE 2nd Avenue in the Shores.  Of course, we don't have available parking, as they do on 2nd Avenue in the Shores, but again, what would you think of 6th Avenue here being zoned for storefronts or home businesses that could accommodate patrons?

We Failed (Ourselves)

Last night, the Commission had its first meeting to set the TRIM (ad valorem taxation rate).  The meeting was only to set a maximum for the coming year, and in the budgeting and taxation process, which will take about a month more, we can refine and lower from last night's maximum.  But if we come to think we guessed wrong, and the taxation rate should have been higher, we cannot go above whatever we agreed upon last night.

The maximum the Commission could have set last night was 10 mills.  That's $10 of tax per year for every $1000 of value of the property.  But the value is the assessed or taxable value, not the market value, and deductions are taken for homesteaded properties.  A realtor tells me my house has a market value in the mid $400Ks.  My taxable value last year was either $126K or $101K.  The School Board thinks I have a higher taxable value than do the other taxing agencies.

Our millage for last year was 9.7.  The question was what millage would we choose for the coming year.  We can choose any millage we want, as long as it's not higher than 10.

As a frame of reference, considering the taxable values of all taxable properties in the Village, 0.1 mills this year will be worth about $15K to the Village.  If we charged ourselves 0.1 mill more, or 9.8 mills, the Village would get $15K more in ad valorem taxes.  If we charged ourselves 0.1 mill less, or 9.6 mills, the Village would get $15K less.  It's harder to translate this into what property owners would pay, because property values are very different from one property to another, but the average difference 0.1 mill makes to BP property owners is about $15.  A tax of 9.8 mills would add about $15 to the average tax bill of BP property owners.  A tax of 9.6 mills would save the average BP property owner about $15.

That's not to say that the bill would be $15 different than it was last year for the average owner.  Because valuation changes even when the millage doesn't.  The "advantage" of the homestead exemption is that it prevents property taxes for people who rely on their homes to live in from experiencing extremes of tax increase, with changes in property values.  No matter how high and how fast property values increase for homesteaded properties, the taxable value can only increase a maximum of 3%.  But it can increase by that 3%.  So no one can hope that their tax will never go up.  It most certainly can.  If a homeowner is on such a tight budget that he cannot afford to pay more than he does in taxes, then he is an unfit property owner.  He might as well be able to afford to buy food, only on condition that the cost of food never changes.

Introductory comments last night, from non-Commissioner residents, Commissioners, and our Manager all mentioned responsibilities we are not currently meeting.  The millage the Manager proposed was 9.7, the same as it was for the year just ending now.  This proposal has no actual meaning.  It appears to suggest that taxes will be the same as they were last year, but this is not at all true.  With the increase in property values, and some impressive recent sales, at 9.7 mills, we will all be paying a higher tax than we did last year.  To pay the same tax as we did last year, or the average of us did, we would have had to tax ourselves at 8.7 mills.

But here's the problem.  Even at 9.7 mills, there is no provision for meaningful improvement of anything in the Village, and even not all normal and routine maintenance is covered.  If we tax ourselves at 9.7 mills, we collect more money than we did last year, and we still fall behind our normal daily responsibilities.  And again, there is no provision for improvement.

When I ran for office, my slogan was "For the Best We Can Be."  As a Commissioner, I have lived by that motto.  I still do.  It's engraved on a small plaque next to my name plaque on the Commission dais.  I paid extra to get that plaque, because I didn't want it overlooked that that's how I got where I am, and that's my mission for the Village.  The Best We Can Be.

My position last night was simple.  We cannot meet our responsibilities to ourselves as owners of this municipality if we charge ourselves 9.7 mills.  If we charge ourselves 10 mills, we still can't meet our responsibilities to ourselves.  But it's the most the Commission, on its limited authority, can do.  We cannot do all the maintenance we should, and we cannot do any real improvement.

But for last night, at the special Commission meeting, it was the best we could have done to make the Village The Best We Can Be.  The difference between 9.7 mills, which was the Manager's proposal, and 10 mills is not much.  It's only about $45K more to our Village.  And it would cost the average BP property owner about $45 more than he would otherwise pay.  In my case, last year, I paid a total ad valorem tax, to the County, the School Board, and the Village, of $3331.26.  I'm homesteaded, and it will go up 3% this year.  That's another $100.   What I proposed last night would cost me yet another $45.  So my $3331.26 would turn into about $3476.26.

Roxy Ross suggested a millage of 9.8.  She said she was ambitious, too, but not as daredevilish as I was.  David Coviello didn't want to raise the tax rate.  He wanted to keep the millage at 9.7.  Actually, he wished we could lower the tax rate, but he felt that this year was perhaps not the year..  (The tax goes up anyway, with property values and taxable value, so it wasn't clear what Dave thought he was accomplishing.)  Bob Anderson and Barbara Watts simply didn't want to raise the taxes.  Again, as with David Coviello, they seemed to ignore the fact that taxes go up anyway, unless we lower them considerably to the "fall-back" rate of 8.7 mills.  No one proposed doing that, although it wasn't clear why not, since David, Bob, and Barbara all didn't want to increase the tax burden on BP property owners.

We had an interesting investigation of what proportion of the Commission was needed to set a millage at 9.7.  According to a seemingly obscure State regulation, if we raise taxes by more than 10% of what they were in the preceding year (if we taxed ourselves at 9.7, this actually resulted in an ad valorem revenue of 110.89% of what it was last year, so 10.89% increase over last year), then a "supermajority" is needed to pass the new rate.  A supermajority on our Commission is four Commissioners.

I refused to vote for any tax below 10 mills.  Roxy Ross held firm at 9.8.  The other three could not pass 9.7 without either Roxy or me.  But the Manager and the Village attorney re-reviewed the Statute, once it was clear neither Roxy nor I would budge, and they re-interpreted it somehow to mean that a supermajority would not be needed to approve 9.7.  So that's what happened.  Coviello, Anderson, and Watts agreed to 9.7, and Ross and I voted against.

It's too bad it wasn't only Roxy and I who lost.  The whole Village lost.  Our big victory, a savings for the average property owner of either $15 or $45 for the year, deprived the Village of either $15K or $45K, money that could have gone toward things that any of us, and even any of the Commissioners, agreed was important.

Clearly, there was the usual pablum about sharpening pencils and finding the money somewhere else in the budget.  But the problem is that no matter what we do with the budget, and even if we charge ourselves 10 mills, we still fail to do what this municipality should do for itself.

Our "new" millage is truly a pyrrhic victory.

Tap78: A "Gastropub"

First of all, apart from being a trendy term, what does "gastropub" mean?  I'm asking.

Second, why would a restaurant (that's what this place is) on 79th Street call itself Tap 78?

But I have bigger fish to fry than fussing about the designation and the name.  This is another of those "good news, bad news" situations.  Here's the good news.  All of it at once,  Lavished on you.  The food was good.  It wasn't great, and my companions and I did not eat anything the establishment prepared.  We got tapas, which were three kinds of cheese, two kinds of ham, some toasted and buttered bread (OK, they toasted the bread), about six olives, and very small dollops of hummus and what was either olive or fig tapenade.  We didn't ask, but I suppose it's possible they made the hummus and tapenade, too.  Let's give them that.  They're only hanging on by a thread anyway.

Here's the bad news.  The menu said wine and beer were half price from 4-7 PM.  We got there at about 6:40 PM.  Great news, right?  No, our stressed out waiter kid said, wine is not half price.  It clearly says it is, we protested.  Well, it isn't, he tragically reassured.  Why we were still sitting there is another matter, and we can take it up with our therapists.  In any event, we agreed to beer.  There's a decent enough beer menu, but we then learned that only an unpredictable sampling of this list is half price.  We agreed to two different beers on tap, and both were good.

The other theoretically good news was that on Thursdays, tapas are half price, too.  What was also not stated on the menu, even in fine print, was another capricious restriction: half price tapas begin at 7 PM.  The trick for us was to order our beer quickly, before 7:00, then wait for our stressed out, way-too-busy, increasingly uninterested waiter kid to come back, which he was never going to do on his own initiative, without prodding from us, so we could order our tapas.  This, in itself, was grossly unsatisfactory.  In the meantime, we all agreed the bugs were getting the best of us, so we transferred ourselves inside, to the noisy and crowded dining area with the equally frustrating "service."

My companions and I agreed that the small tray of tapas, etc, would not nearly have been worth $30.  It was barely, but possibly, worth the $15 our wonderful half price deal demanded.  But at that point, we were eager to wrap things up and get out.  There was just the matter of the bill, which was slightly easier to get than the food had been.  Somehow, I got excused from paying, so I didn't take more than a cursory look at the bill.  It was about $74, before the "tip" (which was going to send a message to our "server").  I was thinking the bill was higher than I expected, but my companion who wanted to pay it snatched it away.  He came back after a while, and announced that after a more careful perusal, and some confronting and negotiating, the staff agreed that half price discounts had somehow not been applied, and that the real total was $39.  Plus a tip that would be intended to give the waiter kid something to think about.

Give them another try?  Um, no, I wouldn't think so.  "You only get one chance to make a first impression," and these people have way too much competition for me to waste more time and money on them.  Besides, I've reverted to a preference for vegetarian fare, and boy, were they short of that.  Suit yourselves, but I'll be elsewhere.

One Step Closer… Annexation Update

During this month’s BP Commission meeting we were informed that our annexation application has gained approval from the Miami Dade County Planning Advisory Board. The vote was unanimous -6 in favor; zero against in recommending moving this forward, without any further delay, to the County Commission. North Miami’s application was summarily denied.

I wanted to share this news along with the link of the meeting for those who would wish to view it. The link is here:  http://miamidade.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=2&clip_id=3482

Our Village Manager, Heidi made a compassionate speech centered on “Wants verses Needs.” It clearly struck a chord with the Planning Advisory Board members.

This is a very positive next step towards our annexation goals!

 In my opinion, North Miami has little to no leverage left moving forward. If they remain entrenched in their belief of “if we can’t have it, nobody can,” that philosophy may be more damaging to them than in accepting the defeat and moving forward with their “other” annexation plans.  

This has all the making of a true David vs. Goliath comparison as was mentioned by the opposing attorney. It would seem as if Goliath took another rock upside his head…

We’re not at the finish line yet, but did take another important step forward towards our desired outcome.

Best,

Milton Hunter

 Biscayne Park Resident

P.S. Thanks to Chuck Ross for both finding and forwarding us the link for the PAB meeting.  

"Lead, Follow, or Get Out of the Way." Lee Iacocca

We're on the path to getting our new administrative annex building completed, and our Village Hall renovated.  The former is taking shape, and the latter is about to be under way.  The plans are firm and satisfactory.  The financing appears to be a bit of a moving target.  No one is pleased about that.  But we know where we're going, and it's clear we're going to find our way there.

Could there be anyone who isn't on board at this point?  Evidently there could.  And there is.  Not only are some Village residents sniping at the plans and the planners, but even some former Commission members are launching spitballs.   The importance of this is that we have relied for about 82 years on our log cabin as the seat of Village government.  Most Village employees work there, and our records are there.  If this structure was adequate when the Village had less than 100 homes, and just a few residents, it's unimaginable that it could be adequate now.  But not one Commission before the current one lifted a finger to make, or propose, changes.  It's not even clear anyone ever asked any questions.  Repairs were piecemeal and slipshod, the result in recent years including active leaking when it rained, rats running free in the building, and one toilet that sat on rotten flooring which constantly threatened to give way.

It might be understandable that non-Commission Village residents are skittish about repairs, renovations, and new construction which will strain Village finances for some years to come.  It's not understandable that past and present Commissioners are criticizing, scolding, and catastrophizing.  They had their chances to do something before now.  They chose not to.  They didn't lead when they could have.  They don't want to follow the lead of other more constructive Commissioners now.  Lee Iacocca leaves them one other strategy.

"The Residents Don't Want It."

I have a problem, and a dilemma.  At the Special Commission meeting this past Tuesday, Steve Bernard arose to scold and blame the Commission for pursuing annexation.  And incurring a charge for this pursuit.  He told us that regarding annexation, "the residents don't want it."  Steve's comment should not simply be written off as typical whining and griping and sarcastic sniveling.  Yes, of course it was all of that, but there was something else in what he had to say.  There was that provocative affront: the Commission has acted on an initiative that the residents don't favor.

Let's assume Steve was talking about someone other than himself and a small handful of other BP residents.  Let's assume he was properly referring to a notable number of people.  He likened the complained-of Commission action over the objection of some BP residents regarding annexation to the Commission's action over the objection of residents regarding outsourcing sanitation.  We still have no idea how many people didn't want to outsource sanitation, because those who said they didn't want it were misinformed about what it was they were asked to repudiate.  But let's assume, for purpose of discussion, that a few hundred BP residents don't want to annex anything.

The question is, then, what do these residents want?  Do they want, as some of them say, the Village to operate more efficiently, to free up money that they portray as wasted somewhere in Village finances?  Do they imagine they're talking about enough money to make a meaningful difference?  Over the tenures of the last Village Manager and the present one, the Village has undergone very major trimming and tightening up.  If anyone could find a few more dollars in the budget (and I'm quite sure each of us could), they wouldn't be enough to fix what's broken around here.  They certainly wouldn't improve the medians, or the streets, or the drainage problems, or erect a wall along the track, or rehab the recreation area.  They certainly wouldn't have gotten an administration building built, or the log cabin renovated.

The Village has nothing meaningful to sell (it's mostly building permits and site rentals), so there's no real opportunity to increase revenue there.

We can increase taxes as properties sell, but if the Village is kept in it's sadly modest state, we're not talking about major increase in value.  And the same people who don't want to annex, or didn't want to outsource sanitation, also don't want the Village intruding on homeowners' prerogatives, like by making demands for Code-based property improvement.  Staying as we are depresses us.

Is it possible, then, that those who don't want annexation don't really want anything?  We're run down, in need of repair, and we should stay that way?

Barbara Kuhl talked about the Village she wants to see.  She wants to see, and live in, the "Mercedes Benz" of Villages.  Neither Steve Bernard nor anyone else expressed disagreement with her.  And Barbara added that she would like to see more community commitment, through actual money donation.  She said, mistaking slightly, that it seems to have been easy to raise money for public art.   She and Gary made it easier than it would have been without their contributions, but I wouldn't say it was exactly easy.  It was long, hard, frustrating, door-to-door work that barely got us where we needed to go in terms of raising money.  And some donors gave much more than others, to make up for shortfalls each time.  I don't disagree entirely with Barbara if her point was that we could support ourselves, but I don't think it's likely as successful, and certainly not as easy, as she seems to think,

I do wish Steve, or anyone else who doesn't want to annex, had had more to say about what they do want, and how they want to accomplish it.  I've said before, and I'll say again, I would vote to stop the annexation project in a heartbeat, if someone would only come up with a better and reliable plan.  All I want is to know of a scheme that gets us considerably more income than we have, so we can do what we as an independent municipality should do.  I've heard from more than one person that if we can't do that, we should surrender, pack it in, and give ourselves back to the County, so they can manage us their way.  If we're not self-respecting, and if we're incompetent, we have no business pretending we can exist on our own.

This, here and now, in this blog, is the time to offer something.

(SC)AMAZON

Two people told me about the goings-on with their accounts at Amazon.  Each had been a faithful patron of the site, and neither uses it much (or at all?) any more.  Both stories started with the same troubling observation: prices keep going up, and they change unpredictably.

Here's what appears to be happening, at least as my two informants have put it together.  If you're an avid user of Amazon, and especially if you agree to their special registration deal, they watch you carefully.  They especially like it if you make recurring purchases of something you use regularly.  They are like pigs in, um, mud, if you let them take the liberty to charge you like clockwork every month or two for your recurring purchase.

You discover two things, if you happen to be paying attention.  One is that the price begins to creep up.  You might not notice this, unless you monitor your credit card bill, because the increases are subtle.  But you have been profiled, and you have been taken for granted.  These increases that you might have written off as due to inflation or something are nothing of the kind.  You come to realize this because of the other thing you might discover.  If you happen to go to Amazon from someone else's computer, not the one you normally use, and not from the one which Amazon has come to recognize, you will find that the prices charged to others are lower than the price charged to you.  If you think this represents a flash sale, which is what Amazon would like you to think, it isn't.  Go back to your own computer, and check the price again.  It's higher.  Now go back to your friend's computer, and look again.  Lower.

The fact is, after Amazon gets done having its way with you, and if you haven't gotten so lazy that you don't comparison shop any more (your assumption is, quite naturally, that Amazon has wonderful pricing that doesn't need be checked), you will find that Amazon charges more than other vendors for the things you want to buy from them.  They're counting on your laziness not to figure that out.

Here's another version of this problem.  I know someone else who has gotten himself into the business of selling stuff on Amazon.  He gets new stuff, and he lists it and sells it there, for more, or sometimes much more, than he paid for it retail.  Sometimes, he lists stuff he doesn't even have yet.  He finds things on sale, and he lists them for whatever price he wants.  If someone buys it from him on Amazon, he then goes and buys it from Target, or wherever he found it on sale, and he sends it to his customer.  My first thought was to wonder why anyone would pay him more than they could pay a store for the same item.  Now I know.  They assume Amazon pricing is good, and they don't ask any questions, or bother to comparison shop.  They've been had by Amazon, and the guy I know becomes a beneficiary of this system.  He himself can't explain why his customers overpay him.  But he doesn't know what I now know.

Online shopping is a tricky business.  Registering yourself, and giving credit card information, is only the least subtle risk you take.  Watch out for Amazon.  They didn't become as big and as rich as they are by accident or simple good fortune.

Do You Get What You Pay For?

Lately, there has been an expression of  concern over the idea of paying for a study.  The matter is roads and drainage.  We are to pay about $200K for two work plans.  Some Village residents don't approve, and they don't understand why we should pay for something that has no tangible result.

I have had calls and e-mails expressing concern, or complaint, over this expense, and one of our neighbors, Steve Bernard, has circulated one of his typical e-screeds about it.  The salient complaint is always the same: we should pay for a study, the result of which does not include any work done on the roads?

Funny enough, Steve Bernard happens to be an architect.  As far as I know, that is his one and only profession.  It's the only way, I'm told, he earns a living.  Steve's job is to learn of someone's ambition regarding something they would like to construct, and to apply study and expertise to designing, or imagining, a structure that will fulfill that ambition.  I myself am not an architect, and I have no idea what goes into the production of such a plan.  When I was a member of the Planning and Zoning Board, I saw some architectural plans, and I could see what they're about.  They're just pieces of drafting paper with drawings on them, representing the outlines, or schematic diagrams, of what the imagined building would look like.  And despite the fact that the architect does not do any actual construction, you still have to pay the architect, after which you have to pay the builder who does the "real work."

Since architects make a living, but they don't actually build anything, I'm guessing their clients are asked to pay the architects only for advice and drawings.  I imagine the fee depends on the scope of the intended work.  Maybe it depends on the skill or repute of the architect.  But one way or another, the client of an architect will pay money and walk away with no more construction than there was to begin with.  Whatever was paid will not get one concrete block set.  Is that strange?  Is architecture an odd business?  Should people who are asked to pay an architect for nothing but a scheme be up in arms?

I myself am a doctor.  I'm not a surgeon.  I just listen to someone's complaint, and I advise them what they should do about it.  I charge for that service.  And they don't have to take my advice.  But they do have to pay for it.  Should patients insist upon a free initial consultation, and only pay for services they agree to receive?  In fact, should they only pay if they think they benefited?

We in the Village have paid for studies before.  We've paid for traffic studies, and some of us have relied on the results of those studies.  We've used them as reasons to make statutory changes, as in the speed limit.  But the studies themselves represented only observation and measurement of traffic patterns, and sometimes advice about adjustments that could be made.  The studies didn't do or change anything.  They just gave us information.  That's what the current proposed studies are intended to do.  They're like a traffic study, or a doctor's advice, or an architect's drawing.  They just provide vital information we could not get any other way, and we need that information in order to make the tangible, substantive changes.