The Freedom Tower

There is widespread disagreement about the value of closing the doors of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation. Is it really a good idea?
Some are saying the agency’s decision to shut down is a simple case of cut and run.
This is a simple minded view of a much more complicated problem.
“Now that the Freedom Tower has been fully built and rises magnificently out of what was once an ugly, empty, forlorn pit, it’s fitting that the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. is set to close up shop,’ the New York Post said. “Thank goodness the LMDC officials were able to get the World Trade Center’s insurers to avert further legal action and cough up all the money needed to fund the tower.
“What a miracle that the agency got all the sparring parties to agree on an acceptable, affordable plan for a cost-saving memorial and museum at the site.”
That’s tabloid sarcasm.
The agency explained the decision in its own words.
“The LMDC had a mission, and we’re nearing the end of the mission,” an agency spokesman said. The agency notified the 54 employees of the agency last month.
LMDC President Stefan Pryor says the real job of the $2.5 billion agency had always been temporary.
“The greatest accomplishment of a public agency such as ours is to successfully work itself out of existence,” he told reporters. The unfinished jobs will be passed around to other agencies more suited to make sure the work is completed.
No one, from the very beginning of this morass, has had all of the answers when it came to this project. Diversify is an old axiom of business. It might work in this business too. Who knows?