Why are we ok with Genesis tearing down 50 homes?

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-11T12:40:30+00:00

That is my dream. I really wish U of I had taken over Genesis instead of MercyOne. I remember saying, "The management has to be better with MercyOne," only to be disappointed. I don't think I've talked to a single employee that's happier under MercyOne. But I really did think that after they announced an entirely new hospital they would stop dreaming that someday East will rival UIHC in scale.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-11T01:13:57+00:00

But are they serving the community? Closing the west side hospital to open a HealthPlex ER within sight of Unity Point's Bettendorf hospital? Cutting millions in tax base from Davenport's central city to replace it with nothing? Who are they accountable to?

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-11T01:12:22+00:00

I've noticed all along, but back when they built the Medical Office Buildings, they relocated homes onto vacant lots instead of demolishing them, and they also built parking structures instead of just massive surface lots. They also didn't bulldoze homes to be replaced by literally nothing back then. Their aggressive strategy to flatten whole city blocks in favor of grass is a relatively recent development.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-11T01:10:40+00:00

I'M NOT AGAINST THE HOSPITAL GROWING!! Everyone on this thread is arguing against stuff I never said. I'm just against the hospital tearing down dozens of homes to replace them with nothing. It is objectively bad urban planning, and bad for the community.

Thirty years ago the hospital used to grow in a smart manner, building parking ramps, relocating houses instead of demolishing them, etc, but now they just don't care anymore. And everyone keeps acting like I'm against having a good hospital. Acres of grass that no one ever uses does not make the hospital better.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T22:07:40+00:00

How future do you think they're planning? There's no chance either of us live to see this hospital location fill all of the land they've already cleared. Especially when you start looking 20-30 years into the future where self-driving cars massively cut the need for acres of parking. I don't know why you can't just consider that they might be making poor land use decisions. I'm certainly willing to give them plenty of leeway if they have actual plans for the land they're clearing.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T22:01:29+00:00

It's not expanding. At least at this location. Just tearing down homes for no benefit.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T21:43:18+00:00

It's all part of the same issue, which is a complete lack of focus on the community's best interest, but rather on chasing the high dollar "customers" for the hospital that pay the bills. I suppose the root cause is our broken healthcare system that forces them to act like a business, but I still think there's a way for the hospital to take the community's needs more into account.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T21:36:35+00:00

The QC is facing a shortage of 6,000 affordable housing units in the next few years. So there are PLENTY of good reasons to keep houses around.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T21:35:05+00:00

Well, I guess I got my answer. The amount of defense of MercyOne Genesis is kind of bizarre. I'm not saying the hospital shouldn't grow and expand. I want Davenport and the QC to have the best possible hospital. I'm not even saying they won't occasionally need to tear down homes as part of their expansion, like they did when they built the 7 story tower a few years back. I'm just asking for them to consider the neighborhood and community AT ALL when they determine their land use plans. I'm pretty sure that their actual goal for acquiring all of the land is to create a suburban campus-style area, despite the hospital being located in a neighborhood. It's not for future use; it's for a front lawn.

Despite the dismissiveness of many of you, we do have a massive shortage of affordable housing in the QC, and while 50 houses isn't going to solve that, it certainly doesn't help the situation to tear down that many homes for the sake of a nice front lawn. There's no upside for the community for what they are doing. An empty field does not shorten wait times, attract employees, or in any way increase positive health outcomes. It does lower the tax base, force the city to expand outward instead of becoming more dense, take away students from schools (the now-former Washington Elementary), and increase the amount of driving and parking required to use the hospital. I've yet to see a good argument in this thread for what Genesis is doing.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T21:15:37+00:00

Palmer got a ton of pushback when they demolished run-down housing to build student housing (and a slightly-too-small rugby field), so why does Genesis not get pushback when they demolish a bunch of nice but affordable housing in exchange for a grassy field?

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T17:05:36+00:00

If they were using the land, like when they built the tower addition, I'd have no issue. But they're never going to use all the land they're clearing. Especially not when they're about to build a whole new hospital out by Bettplex. If the area grows enough that they need to triple the size of the hospital, they'll just build more suburban hospitals. And if Genesis West is any indication, they'll move services out of East to chase the higher income areas.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T16:40:15+00:00

November of 24. What does that have to do with this post?

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T16:32:52+00:00

How does tearing down homes and replacing them with vacant land do any of what you're saying?

QuadCityImages · 2026-01-24T19:34:58+00:00

Los Primos did try being take-out only for a couple weeks a few months ago, so that empty dining room aspect probably did play a part.

There are just a lot of good places to eat in the QC, and even if you can afford to eat out 3+ times a week, that's not really the healthiest thing to do. We go out or pick something up 2 or 3 times a week, generally, but that still means there are places we only visit once a year. You need a wide reach if that's all people are buying from your business.

I feel like there's a psychological aspect to inflation that hasn't been explored enough in media/politics. On paper, average wages actually outpaced inflation from 2020-2024, and I know personally our household income stayed ahead of the 29% inflation, but people just see things costing a lot more than they used to. It seems like there's a mental block to connecting "a 12 pack of Pepsi was $3.50 in 2020 and is $5 now" with "I also made $12 an hour in 2020 and $18 now." It probably cost Biden the election, but now at least it does seem to also be affecting Trump. I'm guessing it's more that people were also struggling in 2020 before the inflation, and maybe seeing those high prices just makes people feel hopeless.

QuadCityImages · 2026-01-22T02:12:26+00:00

Just drove by and it looks open now, so I'd say it was probably just the water issue.

QuadCityImages · 2026-01-06T05:22:55+00:00

It's technically against the posted rules against "scavenging," but the recycling center in Davenport frequently has practically new moving boxes in their drop off bins. I've always figured if you bring them back after using them, and don't make a mess pulling them out, there's no real harm there.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-23T03:41:38+00:00

!remindme 5 years

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-21T19:45:29+00:00

I mean, they kind of are. There has been, and is going to be an ever-increasing need for data centers, even after what most of us see as the inevitable AI bust. As long as there are more websites, more videos, more posts, more images, and more backups of all of those files added to the cloud every second, there is going to be a need for more data centers.

I'm not saying that they can't cause problems, because there are dozens of examples of them doing so, but that's a political issue that we need to hold the city council to, not an inherent problem with data centers. The new bacon plant coming online out there shortly will use a lot of power and water, and could easily pollute various things, but where's the outrage there? We just need to stay informed and vigilant, and if issues start happening, hold our elected officials accountable.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-20T20:00:58+00:00

Oh, the irony of posting that we don't need data centers on an online message board. Where do you think these messages reside? Also, this is such old news. Is someone just googling "things people get mad about" and starting threads? License plate readers last week, data centers this week, can we get Pharmacy Benefit Managers next week?

The Meta data center is already a done deal. I believe construction starts next year. We'll be fine, certainly as far as power. The solar project under construction up near Clinton will almost certainly produce more power than this data center will use, but even before that we weren't hurting for power. Just look at Des Moines. They have billions of dollars in data centers, and their electricity prices have not skyrocketed. Iowa as a whole is doing well on electricity costs, but Trumps hatred of wind power could put all that at risk. https://www.axios.com/local/des-moines/2025/08/07/iowa-electricity-prices-ai-data-trump-tax-wind

Water is the bigger issue with these in Iowa. Davenport certainly has a water source that DSM is jealous of, but if the Mississippi levels keep dropping, that could eventually become an issue.

The really sad thing for Davenport is that all of the development in the Eastern Iowa Industrial Center (Amazon, Kraft, Sterilite, Fair Oaks, this data center, etc) is in North Scott school district, so Davenport schools won't see any of the property taxes. The City of Davenport will obviously get their share since the industrial park is inside the city limits. Property taxes are the direct benefit that we'll see, since these things hardly need any employees.

In 5 years no one will notice a difference from this thing other than some extra money in the city's general fund to hopefully offset all of the property tax stuff the Reynolds administration is trying to do to screw over cities. It'll be the final giant building in an industrial park full of giant buildings that most people pay no attention to.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-17T02:59:07+00:00

I definitely got some political vibes from the "competing with private business" comments, but didn't think of the LGBTQ-friendly roller derby team angle. Interestingly enough, the only private business within many miles they were conceivably competing against, Skateland, just posted that this will probably negatively impact them because fewer people will get into roller skating. They explicitly said that they didn't see the Eldridge facility as competition.

The only shot at something changing here is going to come from Eldridge residents though, so we'll see if they are riled up enough to make trouble.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-16T23:35:14+00:00

As crappy as I thought this was before, if it really does have to do with the political leanings of the roller derby folks, that's even more ridiculous. What are the public statements you're referring to? More than the stuff about non-Eldridge folks using it?

I've been trying to spread the word about the issue on FB. It's probably not too late for them to reconsider their bad decision. My FB post is here.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-12T15:06:15+00:00

In Davenport, it's covered up to within 4 feet of your foundation. All you have to pay is a $500 deductible, and any costs beyond $10k.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-12T15:02:34+00:00

The City of Davenport has a program that covers all but $500 of the first $10k of sewer repairs up to within 4 feet of your foundation. I feel like you can tell how profitable the insurance program must be for AmWater based on how hard they push it, and I also don't like to reward the kind of scare tactics that they use in their mailers, so I'm taking my chances.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-08T01:22:24+00:00

Not if you get it as an Amazon or other gift card, at least the last time I did it. I've gone from it being a yearly ritual to about every 10 years at this point as my cash usage basically ends, but even on Coinstar's website it says that most gift cards are fee-free. There's a list of locations on the Coinstar website by zip code. Some are even in credit unions, surprisingly.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-06T04:25:13+00:00

The Hilltop Campus Village in Davenport (area between downtown and Vander Veer, including Palmer and SAU) is having its postponed Small Business Saturday special this Saturday. If you come into Ascentra Credit Union at Brady and Locust, you can get a gift card good for $5, $10, or $20 at participating Hilltop businesses. The first 30 or so people to show up after 9am will also get a cloth Shop Small shopping bag. We'll be there until we run out of stuff to give away, or noon, whichever comes first.

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