The Wiz's Castle

Apparently a miracle worker has arrived in town. A real wizard. For the sake of brevity, lets just call him “the Wiz."

The Wiz recently made a presentation explaining various miracles he wants to perform in conjunction with a massive castle he would like to make appear. The audience at this meeting included the Department for Assessing Magical Proposals (DAMP) that oversees proposed castle construction in this area, various professionals and politicians, a large contingent of local citizens, and a bunch of people who have exactly no stake whatsoever in whether these miracles occur or not, but apparently are friends of the Wiz.

Now, what exactly are these miracles?

Let’s start with the Low Income Persons (LIP) obligation that the DAMP’s jurisdiction would incur as a result of the Wiz’s activities. Although the initial LIP service was about 214 units and the Wiz had offered to build 264 units [out of the goodness of his heart], and although the even stronger NJ State Wizards had recently waved their wand and increased these numbers…Well, the Wiz is going to get a waiver so that he only has to make 45 LIP units appear. It wasn’t clear how the Wiz was going to accomplish this enchantment, but apparently it is such a hard spell that the town would have to help him with this magic.

Another miracle that the Wiz is going to perform involves various aspects of water – wastewater, stormwater, floodwater, and drinking water.

Starting with wastewater, the Wiz is going to get yet another division of the aforementioned very powerful State Wizards to let the castle have sewers without delay even though it took the apparently weak local magicians 28 years to get their sewers to appear. It isn’t exactly clear what spell is going to make his castle’s wastewater disappear, but it better not involve a really big moat and a lot of pump trucks.

Stormwater and floodwater can be handled as one in this particular area, as rain and floods go hand-in-hand. Apparently the Wiz feels he has stronger magic and better spells than Mother Nature, the NJ DEP wizards, and the Federal Wizards. It appears that the Wiz had his local friendly ghost (who currently haunts the fields where the Wiz wants to put his castle) send in some information to the DEP wizard to assist with his magic spell.

The Wiz apparently felt that Mother Nature had provided sufficient potable water for everyone to share; therefore no magic would be needed to protect existing local wells.

Traffic spells appear to be a specialty of the Wiz. Despite their castle having up to 2,200 residents, at least 1,400 employees, delivery trucks, garbage trucks, and visitors, it is enchanted and will produce no extra traffic problems in the area. Oh, yeah, and don’t forget the extra vehicles from their 214…or 264…or 45 LIP service units…which also won’t have any effect on traffic.

There is also some money magic involved, apparently related to the ability of the castle residents to be in two places at once. The residents of this enchanted project will all stay on site because it is gated and they perceive it to be safer than the surrounding areas - except for the LIPs who will be located in the apparently risky area outside the gates. The Wiz will provide the residents every form of business they will need to live – food, drink, medical care and medicine, beauty salons, pools and gyms, and all manner of activities. But, and here is the magic, these same residents will also appear outside the castle walls, spreading their largess in the nearby village which is selling the same products that the Wiz is already providing inside the walls so that the residents never have to leave…oh, never mind.

Since magic needs no explanation, just understand that the Wiz’s new castle will have no effect on local schools, roads, emergency services, hospitals, or any form of infrastructure. The local mortals who will live within a few hundred feet of the moat have nothing to worry about.

Additionally, the Wiz is going to give the local town millions in taxes every year without costing the town a dime. Just like magic.

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Regarding the Department Assessing Magical Proposals (DAMP): they do not always approve castles. Although they only handle applications where the magic would happen within their own jurisdiction, they do consider the negative affect on neighboring DAMP areas.

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“It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.” – Chiffon Margarine advertisements (1971-1979)