Dubuque is experiencing a bit of a rental housing shortage

[47of74]

Because of IBM coming to town Dubuque is experiencing a bit of a rental housing shortage these days. The TH had an article about that yesterday.

Although there are differing views concerning the vacancy rate and number of open units, apartment units are being snatched up around the city, and many landlords and local leaders agree that more housing will be needed soon.

The crunch for finding apartments comes as tenants' tastes shift with waves of new residents, thanks to IBM's move to Dubuque and the 1,300 jobs the tech giant expects to fill. Local landlords report seeing an influx of people looking for low-cost and short-term rentals, as well as families moving from homes in search of larger high-end apartments to house their families and places that allow pets.

The article brought all the racists and teabaggers out of the woodwork to comment on the story.

[rurallib]

1. From some of your earlier posts it looks like there is a hardcore few

who seem to have lots of time on their hands and something in their craw that they want to poison everyone else with. Looks like the same 8 or 10 people comment on every article. And their comment is that gummint is fucked up and will take your rights and i know everything cause i do.
And this is what poisons true discussion. I think online papers may be better off not having comments than to get the wingers spewing their venom from post 1 forward.

[Cairycat]

2. It's the same with the Des Moines Register

and Waterloo Courier as well. If you suffer from hypertension, best to skip the comments. And it's a waste of energy to make informed comments from a liberal perspective.

For a long time, no one used the comments section in the aptly-named Marshalltown Times-Republican, so it was winger-free, amazing for such a red(neck) town. Now they have a few "gubmint can't do anything right" types, but not as bad as some places.

(And calling Marshalltown redneck is the prerogative of a native daughter, so you don't need to get on my case. It's a good place with decent people, just too conservative for me.)

[rurallib]

3. Pretty much why I have given up reading newspapers online

the comments have really ruined it for me. I will always look at the comments. Most stories leave questions to be answered and long ago in cyber time there were some good discussions on relevant points. But that didn't last long before the wingers came in and ruined it. Looking for intelligence in the comment section is like looking for a needle in a haystack anymore.

[47of74]

4. One time it got so bad the TH had to notify law enforcement

One time after the stabbing death of a white man by a black man in downtown Dubuque someone repeatedly posted the image of a lynched black man hanging from a tree. The TH had to disable their comments section entirely. They notified the Dubuque police and the FBI. I don't know what came of that, but the TH brought back the comments section the hole that allowed someone to post the offensive image plugged, and poster IDs verified through either a credit card or a subscriber ID.