Thunder by the Bay II

Suncoast Charities for Children has a challenge: How to turn downtown business owners and residents into fans of the annual event. Where there’s a will, there’s a way.

By Matt Walsh
| 11:00 a.m. January 28, 2016

Sarasota
Opinion

“The responses indicated that Thunder by the Bay was financially beneficial for 15 businesses. For 89 businesses, it was not good. For many, it was a disaster.”
— Norm Gollub, Downtown Economic Development Coordinator

Thunder by the Bay continues to reverberate.

When the city of Sarasota surveyed downtown businesses on how that weekend event affected them, an overwhelming majority said they don’t like it.

To be sure, you can understand the business owners’ displeasure. When they bought or rented their downtown storefronts, they did so with an expectation that their location would serve their business goals and aspirations and be a place to do business peacefully, profitably and devoid of undue disruption.

What’s more, many of these business owners might argue that a couple thousand motorcycles and their roaring engines over a three-day period don’t qualify exactly as peaceful. In fact, many of the downtown merchants and restaurateurs would argue Thunder by the Bay exacts harm — on their financial well-being and quality of life.

How to end the jihad against the West

Editor’s Note: The following excerpts are from Editor Craig Biddle’s “10 Steps to End Jihad against the West,” published in the winter edition of The Objective Standard (TheObjectiveStandard.com). The following is Biddle’s step No. 5.

Use the full force of our militaries to eliminate all Islamic regimes and jihadist groups that have supported or executed attacks against our countries or our countrymen.

All thinking and decision making pertaining to this matter should be guided by the principle that our respective governments and militaries have a moral obligation to eliminate the regimes and jihadists who have attacked us — and to do so as quickly as possible and with minimal risk to the lives of our civilians and soldiers…

… America’s military alone could eliminate any Islamic regime or jihadist group on the planet in a matter of days (if not hours) — if the U.S. government unleashed its forces. America’s military combined with those of other Western nations could eliminate the entire field of enemy regimes and groups in short order — if the West chose to do so.

The jihad against the West persists only because the West has not chosen to end it. This is a moral atrocity.

Westerners have a selfish, moral obligation to end this assault on our lives and the lives of our loved ones. Permitting this enemy to remain in existence is like permitting known serial killers to roam our neighborhoods. It is sheer insanity.

It is time to end the insanity. It is time to end the jihad.

Importantly, by eliminating these murderous groups and regimes, we would not only solve the immediate problem of their existence; we would also strike a significant blow to the root of the longer-term problem.

By summarily eliminating the existing Islamic regimes and jihadist groups that have attacked the West, we would significantly discredit the religion that motivates jihad and that will continue spawning more jihadists until it is discredited.

Although, as noted above, we cannot eliminate Islam (a body of ideas), we can discredit it — and doing so is an essential aspect of winning this war. By demonstrating to jihadists and would-be jihadists that their fantasy God is powerless against the West’s very real militaries — by showing them that Westerners can easily destroy the entire Muslim world if we so choose — we would show them that jihad is a thoroughly hopeless cause…

If we fail to eliminate the jihad-sponsoring regimes and jihadist groups, not only will existing jihadist cells attack the West; new jihadist cells will continue to form and attack as well. If, on the other hand, we end these regimes and groups now, we will cut our losses dramatically and take a giant step toward normal, jihad-free living. The correct choice couldn’t be clearer.

You can identify with them. You wouldn’t want 1,000 motorcyclists gathered on your neighborhood street in front of your home. You would scream at City Hall to stop the disruption. You might even demand some type of compensation for your duress. After all, isn’t that the American way? Sue someone.

But at the same time, everyone engaged in American life knows we all have the right to gather peacefully and lawfully — in someone’s home, in an auditorium, in a public park or on public streets. See First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting … the right of the people peaceably to assemble …”

Which also is to say unexpected occurrences and the occasional disruption to routine — be they planned or spontaneous — are part of American life, part of our free society and human action. There is no such thing on Earth as paradise.

In short, there is no legal remedy to stop a peaceful (i.e. no violence or crime) gathering of motorcyclists.

At the same time, it should be noted, the city’s role in such gatherings is to monitor them and keep order, not to subsidize them with taxpayer dollars.

Which brings us to the standoff that occurs in thousands of communities throughout the United States: Those who see the benefits of attracting large gatherings of people to their communities and those who see large crowds as a disruption to their financial well-being and quality of life.

This dilemma is analogous to the 50-year struggle throughout all of Florida: dealing with population growth. Thunder by the Bay is a microcosm. As Adam Smith put it: “The most decisive of the prosperity of any country is the increase in the number of its inhabitants.” Or: The late Professor Julian Simon, an economist at the University of Maryland who devoted much of writing and research to the effects of population growth, concluded in 1981: “There are not now, and there never have been, any empirical data showing that population growth or size or density have a negative effect on the standard of living.”

But of course, you also have the arguments that population growth, or a sudden influx of motorcyclists, creates negative effects — traffic, street closings, noise, disruption to local businesses, etc.

One of the primary challenges, then, is to figure out ways that the positives of population growth or an influx of motorcycles outweigh the negatives. This is the challenge for Lucy Nicandri, Thunder by the Bay’s executive director and organizer, and her boss, the Suncoast Charities for Children board of directors. How can they turn downtown business owners affected by the event, as well as residents who don’t like it, into supportive fans?

They will never achieve 100% support. But as we wrote last week: “Collaboration and communication with all of the affected constituencies will be crucial, constructive and effective.” Such an effort can address how to make it better — e.g. location, time of year, how best to handle traffic, how to make beneficial for the maximum number of businesses.

To be sure, there always will be those who don’t want Thunder by the Bay, who believe the clientele doesn’t fit. But don’t kid yourself: Those older couples riding their big Harley-Davidsons are not gang members; many of them are wealthy doctors, lawyers and business people — the kind who have money to spend when they visit.

Or look at it this way: Thunder by the Bay, by comparison, creates nowhere near the inconvenience and disruption that the Firestone Grand Prix does in downtown St. Petersburg. For a month before the three-day races, that city erects miles of concrete fences downtown and during the weekend closes off multiple streets. And talk about noise.

In spite of this, the Firestone Grand Prix will celebrate its 13th season this March. The Grand Prix organizers and the city of St. Petersburg have figured out how to make it work.