Air Pollution, Water Pollution, Soil Pollution and Noise Pollution are some of the nasty neighborhood effects we expect when there is a construction project going on next door. But what about Population Pollution and Traffic Pollution?

If we build anything anywhere in Sarasota it will either add density or sprawl - or both - unless they tear down more than they build and that has not been the trend. The people added by the density and/or sprawl will come and go forever, mostly in their cars, and they will waste and discard forever, as we all do.

Or, at least, until the project is torn down in twenty years. Did The Quay even last twenty years? Almost, I think.

So, we think that the "employment" is worth the pollution? Guess what? There is little or even no employment. Oh, the factories in China will get a few extra orders for building materials and the transportation companies will get quite a few trips schlepping the stuff to the site but . . .

The architects will be mostly out of town. They will hire one local firm to do a little change work but most of the design will have been done years ago somewhere else. The foreman on the job might rent a house in town for the duration of the project but the others will be migrant workers "from Texas" as the story goes. The owner of the project might be a five month snowbird from richpeopleville - "up North". The Land Use Attorney might be someone who has abused our city leaders before.

OK, the migrants will "live" in the run-down motels along with the hourly room trade so . . . But the bulk of the money won't stay in town.

We currently have 849 approved projects to be built in the city, and some 35 more on the way. This includes 10 or 12 downtown high rise projects. Enough? Too much? Let's make the next few projects corrective of all the pollution of the last 50 years, and use local people to do it.