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December 17, 2005
Ratner Set to Begin Demolition of Six Buildings
The Courier-Life reprints Ratner's press release word for word with quotation marks.
Perhaps it is more interesting to read a Letter to the Editor regarding another article by the same author, Stephen Witt:
Actually We're Trying to Cut Back on the Paper Bashing, but...Dear Editor:
I’m not sure how much the Downtown Star is into bashing other newspapers, but the gushing profile of Bruce Ratner in the 12/02/2005 Courier-Life is worth calling out. I read most of the local papers every week, and like to consider myself fairly up to date on what is happening, so I read the article with some interest. While discussing Ratner’s background, it was either purposefully misleading, or just downright dishonest. The article said:
“It was while at consumer affairs that Ratner became interested in how major national retail outlets had long underserved inner-city residents and how the city itself had failed to utilize major business and transit hubs to offset corporate flight to New Jersey and the surrounding suburbs. With these thoughts, Ratner became an entrepreneur.”
Decided to become an entrepreneur? The dictionary defines an entrepreneur as “A person who organizes, operates, and assumes the risk for a business venture.” Forest City was a family company begun in 1921 and traded publicly since 1960. All of the seed money for Forest City Ratner came from a publicly traded company. The only risk Bruce Ratner took in starting his company was in hoping his relatives didn’t slap his hand while he held it out. If this makes him an entrepreneur, then being born with a silver spoon in his mouth must mean he is also a smelter.
Sincerely,
Shahn Christian Andersen
Posted by amy at December 17, 2005 10:08 AM