Fang is right. His observations are spot on, not speculative.

Then he should change his name to The Great Kreskin and make a fortune on the lottery, because he has the ability to see into the future not only of this reality but of alternate realities.

Wrote a long post that the board ate. The gist of it was (a) there is no way the city is coming anywhere close to making up for the P&L's deficit in knock-on revenues generated outside the district, (b) that's unlikely to change because (c) the city gave Cordish far too generous a deal, and though (d) the P&L obviously has been a big part of KC's modest urban revival, (e) one shouldn't get into the habit of ticking off all the benefits of public projects while ignoring their costs.

Basically, KC, I'm just saying: you could do so much better.

If the people who founded New York would have had this defeatist attitude, they'd be left holding a bunch of beads and Manhattan would be a giant casino. Our leaders took a chance and should be supported for trying to make the city better. You have no idea whether a better deal was available or not.

Even if they are, it is impossible to know how much of those revenues would have definitely come in anyway, how many [/i]might[/i] have come in anyway, and how many definitely would not have. I really like both loftguy and Fang, but I just don't see how any rational person can claim to have this knowledge. I think general statements like, "Downtown is better off with P&L," are much easier to say are self-evidently true. I agree with that statement overall, but I think it is pointless to write up laundry lists of everything that has come since (and some things that came before!) and claim they are all because of P&L.



Well, we don't really know that, either. Heh.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I don't think anyone is saying that we shouldn't look back at deals like this, evaluate what could be done better, and use them to inform future developments/initiatives. We will not enter into a deal like this again for some time. We are now in a stronger position where we are not necessarily desperate for some major revitalization to occur. In 2003, we were desperate. We found a deal, and we took it. Harping about the costs to the city that result over and over is only helpful if you are using those costs as a reason to not do something in the future. Those are dedicated expenditures that we now live with. They are reality, and any speculation on how things could have been otherwise is just that, speculation. I just don't like that people go on the war path about how the P&L deal is ruining the city (a deal they have had the chance to complain about for almost 9 years now), and they seem to proclaim that after all is said and done, the price we pay over the years will return 0% in value to the city. I would love to hear from those who bang the drum on this issue to see what percentage in value of 100% they think we will achieve based on the money spent. There are bad investments and there are good investments, but sometimes any investment is better than staying dormant.

It's like seeing something at Radio Shack that you know you need and buying it when you see it. Your stereo may not have worked without it, so it is truly a critical component. After you have used the component for a while, you realize that you could have perhaps purchased a cheaper version online, though it would have taken a while to ship from Hong Kong. To me, this is an example of how it makes sense to spend extra to have something critical now vs. relying on the unknown where so much depends on the unknown. In the future, you will probably evaluate the online options first.

It's not unlike the Royals' relying on pitching prospects to pan out, except the city purchased Gil Meche, and he isn't forgoing the remainder of his contract. Now, the city can either follow the Royals and shut down spending on free agents entirely, effectively resorting to minor league quality (aka, potentially second-rate and organic development) to fill in the gaps, or we can learn from our past and realize that smarter investment in the right pieces can be quite rewarding. If we want to be a minor league city, then Gil Meche is as high as we will ever reach, but if we want to grow and compete on a national scale, we have to take some risks and put our money behind those risks. Sorry for meandering all over the place with my analogies.

I like that term "the preponderance of evidence", which leans to Fang's position, anything else is a bit AKP-ish.

As for "doing better", actually, no we couldn't. Probably still couldn't.

I think we can all agree that the sooner this thing pays its own way, the happier everyone will be. If nothing else, it will solve the rampant perception problem.

Totally agree except perception. Perfect example is union station...ask Joe Kansas City today and he will exclaim its a failure not paying its own way. Perception is usually last to change.

And Union Station had to be almost entirely re-purposed (I'm starting to hate that word but it is descriptive) to get to some level of solvency. I'm not sure that kind of make-over is even possible for P&L given location, occupancy in the immediate area and sheer size. The way it was built, it really needs to succeed more or less as intended. Or am I just lacking imagination?

No you're right, as it sits now, the stars would have to align for it to pay for itself. Needs housing and residents and a booming economy for it to work.

I really don't think the economy has to be booming, necessarily. Just get more people living down there. Lots and lots more. And lots more tourists.

The main difference between Union Station and the P&L District is that the losses suffered by the Station were covered by an endowment fund not current tax funds out of the city budget. Plus the fact that the Station was saved via a tax that is no longer on the books, the P&L is like an ongoing tax (at least until the bonds are retired).

Yes, imagine... in 50 years, artists will start moving into those faux warehouse spaces and spruce them up and, whalah, serious development will follow.

Given the fact that many arenas that were less than 40 years old have already been demolished what will take the place of the Sprint Center in 50 years? Demolish part of the P&L and build a new arena there?

What i don't get is how people keep saying the P&L is "losing money". Those bonds were issued to pay for infrastructure investment. The bonds were supposed to be paid for with unrealized future taxes from that site. This essentially made it "free". It is not actually free, the city would still be paying the bonds down with tax money, but only from that site. Since the site isn't able to cover it, they simply have to use other tax money to pay for it that they did not initially intend to use.

Either way they are simply paying for infrastructure improvement with taxes. Its not "losing" anything. When they develop a new neighborhood in the northland by issuing $100million worth of bonds for new infrastructure , are we "losing" money everytime we make a payment on those bonds (i'd argure yes, but for different reasons )? The money is going towards a city investment in infrastructure in the DT core....it is an extremely good use of money. it just isn't being covered in the way they thought.

The quality of retail and nightlife products Cordish has provided is a separate argument.

Utility bonds are retired or paid for by a portion of the water and sewer bills, not general tax revenues as is the case with the P&L.

Ok. Is that different in P&L? The city DOES issue general obligation bonds to build out suburban development in the northland all the time. thats what i'm talking about.

Union station was brought up only as an example of perception. There is no other correlations that can be made with p&l. Completely different developments.

Those GO bonds for there, out south, to the east, and throughout the core are paid by a tax levy that is part of the property tax bill, and needless to say approved by the voters (the P&L was not). With regards to bonds issued for TIF projects those are not GO bonds and except for a case or two are not backed by the city nor its tax base. Those TIF project bonds are retired by the revenues of the project.