February 22, 2011 in News, City

Facilities district seeks $65 million expansion

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Only five years after opening a convention center expansion, the Spokane Public Facilities is pressing ahead with another expansion. This one would cost $65 million.
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Five years after opening a new convention center, the Spokane Public Facilities District is readying plans to ask voters for a $65 million expansion.

The proposal would add more than 90,000 square feet to the Spokane Convention Center, including meeting space that was cut from the 2006 expansion because of budget cuts.

“A lot of the need is just finishing what we started,” said district board member Larry Soehren. “It also gives us a way to enhance the whole river experience.”

The cost would be paid for by extending by 10 years the district’s existing sales and hotel taxes that are currently set to expire in 2033, said district Executive Director Kevin Twohig. It also would use a portion of state sales taxes collected in Spokane, which also are helping to pay for the 2006 addition.

Voters would have to sign off on the extension of the sales and hotel taxes, and some leaders worry that a convention center tax proposal could make approval of other tax measures less likely. In the next year or two Spokane voters could be asked to help maintain police, library and fire services, build a new jail, pay for Spokane Public Schools operations and renovate a building for a regional animal control shelter.

“I just think that the time is wrong,” said Spokane Mayor Mary Verner. “I wouldn’t say it would be too early if the economy were booming, but with all the other demands in the queue for the voters’ attention, I believe the PFD will need to wait.”

City Councilwoman Nancy McLaughlin said recent failure of a property tax for the Mead School District indicates that early next year might be too soon to ask voters for a new convention center.

Asked what she thought of pursuing a new convention center now, McLaughlin said: “Good luck.”

District officials say moving forward next year would keep the district on a planned 10-year cycle for improvements. But they say they are willing to move a vote if other leaders believe the timing is bad.

“We haven’t put a stake in the ground,” Soehren said. “We still have to work with what the rest of the community has on their agenda.”

The addition would be connected to the new convention center on the north side along the Spokane River, where C.I. Shenanigan’s is located. The district bought Shenanigan’s and the 1.2 acres it sits on in 2009 for $4.5 million. The restaurant would be torn down as part of the project.

City Councilman Steve Corker said he has “mixed feelings” about pursuing an expanded convention center. Spokane is “on the cusp” of being able to attract larger conventions, he said, but that ability is hindered by air travel to the city.

“If we could get more air connections that would make a strong argument,” Corker said.

Twohig said besides attracting larger conventions, the addition would allow the district to book more events at the same time.

After the 2002 vote, meeting rooms intended near the new exhibit space were cut from the project because of a spike in materials and construction costs. The lack of meeting space next to the main exhibit hall has drawn complaints from convention center users.

Laura Skaer, executive director of the Northwest Mining Association, said the group’s 2007 annual convention used meeting rooms at the Doubletree Hotel and the convention center’s new exhibit hall for the association’s trade show. The distance between the two areas proved to be a major inconvenience and held attendance down at the trade show, she said.

“We had exhibitors that told us in 2007 that if you don’t fix this, we’re not coming back to Spokane,” Skaer said.

The association held its convention again in Spokane last year, with all events in the old convention center, a plan that worked well for the group. But the space wasn’t big enough to hold all the exhibitors who requested booths for the trade show, she said.

Skaer said she supports an expansion as long as it includes enough meeting space adjacent to the main exhibit hall.

Twohig said the proposal includes 25,000 square feet of meeting space. The convention center currently has 35,000 square feet of meeting space in the old convention center.

Gary Pollard, chairman of the Riverside Neighborhood Council, said he supports the addition. The Riverside neighborhood includes downtown Spokane.

“It will be a big economic development tool for our neighborhood and our city,” Pollard said.

17 comments on this story so far. Add yours!

• 

  misjustice on February 22 at 7:55 p.m.

  Yep. Gimme, gimme, gimme. Who care what the economy is like?

  By the time the 2006 addition is paid for, my 10 year old granddaughters will be 43 years old! Talk about putting the tax bite on our young ones today! And how much more in the hotel/motel tax will they want before 2043? WoW!!!!

• 

  Auko on February 22 at 8:33 p.m.

  Unbelieveable…can you imagine what your property tax bill will look like in the next few years if all of these proposed tax measure are approved? As a long time Spokane resident, I have no problem paying taxes to support this city…if the money is being put to good use. The poor conditions of our streets has long been an issue…the high school dropout rate keeps increasing…police and fire are constantly asking for more money. There comes a point when the working class/middle class have reached a saturation level when it comes to taxes…I think this it it. Enough is enough. Time to vote NO and then move out of this city….

• 

  de3 on February 22 at 9:49 p.m.

  I am aghast … my jaw drops. What are they thinking? Spokane’s economy is a wreck, by summer we will be back to about 20,000 fewer jobs than just 3 years ago and they want more tax money to build an even bigger convention center? We need a real economy, not one based on continuous pouring of tax money into short term job stimulus programs.

  Since early in the decade and expansion of the convention center, the number of non stop cities served by the airport has gone down. Its now about 60% fewer than it was in about 2002 when they began their expansion program. So let’s build a bigger convention center? I’m sure our lack of air travel connections makes this city a prime location for more conventions.

  Since 2002 we’ve poured about $200 million into the airport and a lot of good that did us.

  We’ve lost Kaiser Mead, we’ve lost Agilent, we’ve lost Itronix, we’ve lost Columbia Paints & Coatings and on and on and on. I don’t think we lost them because we needed 90k more sq feet in the convention center.

  I cannot imagine local leadership more out of touch with the reality out here in the streets. I am shocked. I am in disbelief.

  Does anyone ever calculate an honest return on investment and look back and figure out what we did in the past actually delivered the results that were promised?

• 

  DickAdams on February 22 at 10:44 p.m.

  These non-elected officials are utter fools asking for more money. Let them pay off the money spent in the first place. At that time, they did it without a ballot using non-voter bonds and didn`t care what the taxpayers thought about it. Notwithstanding, the financial package was contaminated by refinancing (these jockers would rather use the word, “refunded”) and had to pay off the contaminated bonds in cash before refunding the total financial package to continue with the project. That is fact. I tried to have the Spokesman Review print the story and the newspaper refused. If you remember, the SR pushed for the convention center expansion. Many of the characters involved in the financing were the same people who participated in the River Park Square project (issuing non-voter muni bonds). You remember that rip off forcing the taxpayers to pay for the garage and the ship of fools at city hall gave the garage back to the Cowles. The IRS ruled the bonds used for that project were illegal and the taxpayers got screwed big time with a debt lasting until the year 2030.

• 

  zelda on February 22 at 10:57 p.m.

  It supports business in the dowtown core, I suppose. And for whomever owns the properties and runs the businesses on top of the properties, it means revenue and profit.

  I have to steel myself each time I drive past that ugly convention center. It’s a hazard and a distraction to motorists because it looks like a capsized battleship somehow floated into the middle of Spokane.

  How can anyone look city residents in the eye and with a straight face ask for more taxes to “enhance the whole river experience”? @de3 is right — this is not where money should go to create a sustaining and substantive economy.

  Putting big bucks into convention centers make me think of what New Orleans did (pre-Katrina) to keep their declining city from fading away. It doesn’t augur well.

• 

  Dazzeetrader11 on February 22 at 11:06 p.m.

  They can’t keep the present facility busy as it sits now!
  How many large conventions come as it is? How “large” is “large”? Well usually it’s over twn thousand people.

  How many of those? 2. The facilites district is supported by county city and tax but they report to no one. It’s time to dismantle it. They don’t evenkeep the Arena busy. Outside of SHock games, this year after Elton John’s concert, there is nothing till November. Look up the Spokane Arena’s event schedule. No much to see outside of Chief’s Hockey or the Shock games.

  High time this huge budget was dismantled. Big staff. G and B sels lots of tickets in the offices but does G and B pay rent?
  Not so much.

  Public dole sound familiar? No performance clauses either.

• 

  de3 on February 22 at 11:15 p.m.

  Actually, that is not true - there are things scheduled on the Events Calendar for the CC.
  http://www.spokanecenter.com/centerevents.php

  However, a great many of these use a single room - much of the facility goes unused for many of these events.

• 

  Dazzeetrader11 on February 23 at 1:22 a.m.

  Two things.
  1. If you read what I worte, I was defining the Arena schedule which is pretty sparse.
  2. The Concention Center, as you point out de3 usually uses one or two rooms. One thing NEVER done is a ten thousand or more person event. Not even 5 thousand. AMong the largest events is the Bridal Show in January. The last one drew 175 vendors and there was a total of 1500 people who attended.

  Finally though, does anyone think the center if fully used?
  Does anyone think another $65 million ( union work) dollars of taxpayer money should be used to expand when the place is never full?

  I don’t.

• 

  oneanddone on February 23 at 4:59 a.m.

  You people in Spokane are fortunate that these money grabs are put to a vote. In Cda we have the LCDC which willy-nilly commits future taxes to projects no one, other than business interests, would ever vote for. It’s all a farce.

• 

  riverlaw on February 23 at 6:26 a.m.

  Is there any studies that indicate how much tax revenue this expansion will pay back to our community? How many more jobs?

  How much is the existing facility with its existing level of use paying back to our community?

• 

  jddavis on February 23 at 7:06 a.m.

  Just the other day I was discussing with guys at work what Spokane needed to be “complete.” As strange at it may sound, everyone said the city needed to “enhance the whole river experience”; Mr Soehren, you are an insightful genious!

• 

  lewis8457 on February 23 at 7:18 a.m.

  Verner says we are broke but the facilities department says we are not. i wonder who is telling us the truth.

  In a time when many are out of work and our roads are shot to hell. The facilities department bought the building shenanigans is in last year taking it off the tax rolls. Making the property tax owners pick up that tax. My license tabs are 20 buck more for upkeep of the streets. My city sewer bill went up 51% in 2010, the water went up 17%, gasoline and food is rising in cost daily.

  But Spokane needs automatic toilets for the convention center so we all get to vote in more tax they can waste.

  Sure we will all vote NO but it will pass because the government workers out number us in this town 2 to 1.

  How do you think Tucker keeps getting voted in?

• 

  D Statler on February 23 at 7:33 a.m.

  This could be a dual purpose facility.We could house inmates there too. These rich few in Spokane want all these benefits.These rich few should pay for them themselves.I am glad I will atleast have a vote on a new JAIL and convention center addition.I will ONLY be voting yes on school and fire levies.The rest of you beggars need to get your houses in order!

• 

  D Statler on February 23 at 7:39 a.m.

  Hey Lewis, I didn’t vote for him! LOL. Life long residents like myself are getting embarrassed to say where we are from when traveling.

• 

  Orange on February 23 at 7:46 a.m.

  NO

  There’s my vote.

  Should be a good indication of what to expect when you waste more funds putting this to a vote. The Spokane Public Facilities District needs new leadership.

  Repeal —>district’s existing sales and hotel taxes

  “A lot of the need is just finishing what we started,” said district board member Larry Soehren. “It also gives us a way to enhance the whole river experience.” <—I’m still laughing at this comment. It’s all about the “whole river experience”

  City Councilwoman Nancy McLaughlin said recent failure of a property tax for the Mead School District indicates that early next year might be too soon to ask voters for a new convention center. <—Or at all. The vote will be no then too Nancy. Wake up or I won’t vote for you next time.

  Spokane is “on the cusp” of being able to attract larger conventions <– Who? I think he’s just throwing that one out there.

  De3, and there’s more to come. Two big closers are yet to cry uncle. Keep your ears open.

• 

  johnclarke on February 23 at 8:00 a.m.

  The Northwest Mining convention changes locations every year anyway….and when they do come to Spokane because of the Union. This is nothing but empire building. Spokane will never compete for larger conventions.

  Fix the roads.

• 

  Dazzeetrader11 on February 23 at 10:16 a.m.

  Clarkie!….we agree again! Theres hope for you;)