Squeezing the Big Apple's assets

The City of New York is working to improve its ROA, according to a Bloomberg story today and an RFP posted on the City's website. And it needs help. So it's calling for proposals from investment banking firms to develop creative approaches to better managing the City's assets, starting with parking meters and garages.

The Bloomberg story points out:

"In a request for expressions of interest on its website, the city Economic Development Corp. seeks ideas on how 'to develop new sources of revenue' and restrain costs, as officials confront a projected deficit of almost $5 billion, or 6.8 percent, of an estimated $71.6 billion fiscal 2013 budget."

The sudden inability to raise prices -- in the City's case, taxes and fees -- has forced some creativity in the past. Back in the 1980s, the reversal of the inflation spiral of the 1970s, forced American manufacturers into a massive wave of "asset redeployment" in which businesses and plants were sold, shut down or written off. There are scores of businesses today sold by conglomerates to entrepreneurs that are thriving under new missions and ways of doing business.

It's at least slightly ironic that the movie "Cool Hand Luke" -- the ultimate anti-system tale -- opens with the title character, played by Paul Newman,  robbing parking meters. It will be interesting to see how "the system" in New York is changed for the better  by some creative thinking