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'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

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Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#51

Post by gamblor956 »

costco wrote: post #29

https://opencorporates.com/companies/us_ca/201905210181 says a guy named Thomas Mather was a director. https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/centralvalley/board_decisions... is some government application by Flannery that also has his name on it. Looks like this was covered in 2019: https://www.thereporter.com/2019/07/05/large-rural-land-purc... If Mather is not the true owner, it would take the government five seconds to f…

Lawyers aren't allowed to identify their clients if the identities of their clients are unknown. It's part of attorney-client privilege.

Skadden has made use of in the past to hide their work for Putin affiliates. It's the reason that Skadden is the largest firm by revenue despite the lackluster quality of their work. (For an example of how bad Skadden is at the practice of law, see the clusterfuck that is the Twitter termination litigation.)

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#52

Post by zimpenfish »

DrBazza wrote: post #33
ryandrake wrote: post #15

Setting aside the national security question, more broadly it's pretty insane that the USA lets companies hide who owns/controls them. When you decide to hang out your shingle and profit at the expense of the general public, I would say the general public has a genuine right to know who you are. Reminds me of how Disney used aliases and codenames and shell companies and secretive ownership structures to buy up all th…

Same in the Uk. Anyone can set up a company for pennies. So many expensive homes in London owned by shell companies. The government tried to introduce a law to make the ownership more transparent. Didn’t really work.

> The government tried to introduce a law to make the ownership more transparent. Didn’t really work.

I mean, it's not like they were going to expose their own nefarious dealings...

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#53

Post by voytec »

ryandrake wrote: post #15

Setting aside the national security question, more broadly it's pretty insane that the USA lets companies hide who owns/controls them. When you decide to hang out your shingle and profit at the expense of the general public, I would say the general public has a genuine right to know who you are. Reminds me of how Disney used aliases and codenames and shell companies and secretive ownership structures to buy up all th…

> it's pretty insane that the USA lets companies hide who owns/controls them.

There's sadly been a move also in Europe to make it impossible for the public to learn who really owns a company[1]

[1] https://nitter.net/pevchikh/status/1597588206874157058

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#54

Post by kylehotchkiss »

whalesalad wrote: post #4

If this land is so precious to our national defense, why wasn't the land already owned by the federal government? Eminent domain is the uno reverse card here.

My grandma used to own a house near a naval air station in Virginia Beach. Eventually, the Navy bought the house and surrounding farmland just as what I understand to be a jet bailing area (somebody who lives closer to there can probably correct me on this). They actually offered a fair amount of cash and my grandparents were able to negotiate a little above and nothing had to be seized, thankfully. I'm sad to hear that the house was never torn down afterwards though and likely has squatters in it. I wish they would have done that for my grandparents.

But for the land around Travis Air Force Base... Just seize it. If you're going to buy land around a military base and obscure the owners, that's a fair action. 2-3 seizures like this and the land around military bases will be untouchable in the future.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#55

Post by avmich »

positron6000 wrote: post #18
jeffbee wrote: post #11

This is an incredibly silly story. Everything about this ownership is in public records. Flannery Assoc. has been openly buying land in this are for over 5 years and have spent over a billion dollars and sued dozens of parties. Everyone knows what they are doing. They want to lease the land for energy infrastructure.

flannery assoc is a shell company. who's providing the money for purchasing farmland at 5-10x its worth? can you name a single officer of flannery assoc?

They will gladly name themselves when you ask them on which grounds they want to stop your heavy equipment messing around their properties. They will bring all necessary papers to you. I guess you won't leave until they'll make it absolutely clear that they have the right to demand you to leave.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#56

Post by s1artibartfast »

fnimick wrote: post #48
koolba wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Price gouged? Don't you mean, fair market value? Price is always contingent based on the information shared between the buyer and seller. Since when? Buying and selling anything is always a game of imperfect information. There’s nothing special about the buyer being a large corporation or the item being land.

And shouldn't you support having as much information be available as possible, or do you want people to play games and try to hide info to raise prices on people?

It's not something that needs a uniform solution. Every buyer and seller can decide how much information they want and the price they want.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#57

Post by jeffbee »

maxlamb wrote: post #22
jeffbee wrote: post #11

This is an incredibly silly story. Everything about this ownership is in public records. Flannery Assoc. has been openly buying land in this are for over 5 years and have spent over a billion dollars and sued dozens of parties. Everyone knows what they are doing. They want to lease the land for energy infrastructure.

why would then want to lease land for infrastructure right next to an air force base when there is lots of land further out?

Because it's windy AF and there are already large amounts of transmission lines. Look at all these windmills.

https://www.google.com/maps/@38.141376,-121.8339739,17582m/d...

Also "near Travis AFB" is being used to mean that Travis is in Solano County and most of this property is also in Solano County.

https://app.regrid.com/us/94585#b=none&o=FLANNERY+ASSOCIATES...

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#58

Post by koolba »

fnimick wrote: post #48
koolba wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Price gouged? Don't you mean, fair market value? Price is always contingent based on the information shared between the buyer and seller. Since when? Buying and selling anything is always a game of imperfect information. There’s nothing special about the buyer being a large corporation or the item being land.

And shouldn't you support having as much information be available as possible, or do you want people to play games and try to hide info to raise prices on people?

> And shouldn't you support having as much information be available as possible,

Nope. And arbitrary or subjective standards like that are impossible to enforce anyway.

> or do you want people to play games and try to hide info to raise prices on people?

The example cited is the reverse with the price being lower than would be demanded if the seller knew the buyer had fat pockets.

In either case, caveat emptor[1] (or in this case, caveat venditor).

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caveat_emptor

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#59

Post by s1artibartfast »

numbsafari wrote: post #50
Negitivefrags wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am also an advocate for transparency of ownership of companies, but that Disney example seems like more of a case against transparency than for it? Why should Disney be price gouged in that circumstance?

Why should the sellers be shortchanged?

Nobody was short changed. The fair price is what a buyer and seller agreed to unless someone provided false information.

The word "no" is a complete answer to a request for more information.

Re: 'Mystery company' buys land worth $800M near Travis AFB, raising concerns

#60

Post by Loquebantur »

Negitivefrags wrote: post #21
ryandrake wrote: post #15

Setting aside the national security question, more broadly it's pretty insane that the USA lets companies hide who owns/controls them. When you decide to hang out your shingle and profit at the expense of the general public, I would say the general public has a genuine right to know who you are. Reminds me of how Disney used aliases and codenames and shell companies and secretive ownership structures to buy up all th…

I am also an advocate for transparency of ownership of companies, but that Disney example seems like more of a case against transparency than for it? Why should Disney be price gouged in that circumstance?

By your logic, insider trading would be just fine.

For a market to function properly, information pertinent to traded value has to flow freely. The more you stifle that, the more rigged the market. Essentially, you sustain a monopoly that way.

Of course, people in possession of such "insider information" believe themselves in the right to profit from it. But that perspective is obviously biased and reveals a fundamental conflict between public good and private ownership. From the public perspective, the market works best when monopolies are dissolved quickly.

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