Last Friday a selection committee selected one company from four finalists to lead the planning effort for the revitalization of downtown Wichita. If some city leaders and a few citizen elites had their way, citizens of Wichita wouldn’t be able to see the company’s proposal document until after the city council makes a decision to follow — or not — the recommendation of the selection committee. But thanks to city manager Robert Layton’s decision, this document is now available for all to read. (Thanks also go to council member Jim Skelton, for his unsuccessful effort to release the documents.)
This proposal is available because I requested it (and paid for it) under the provisions of the Kansas Open Records Act. The Wichita Eagle requested it too, and as of the time I received my copy, only that newspaper and I had requested it (along with the other three proposals from the finalists).
I didn’t scan all the pages, leaving out a section about the personnel involved and an appendix of related articles. Still, there’s 109 pages to read — but there are a lot of pictures. Click on
Goody Clancy Proposal for Downtown Wichita Revitalization Master Plan to view or print the document.
(Update: The Wichita Eagle has obtained and posted a much better version of the proposal. It’s complete and in color. Click here and here.)
There are danger signs all over this document. Under the heading “Fiscal Responsibility,” for example, we see “Know the full range of effective public-private finance tools at hand.” Which means, of course, that developers will have their hands in the pockets of taxpayers through devices such as TIF districts, grants, tax credits, abatements, and other forms of subsidy.
Another sign: as a challenge to downtown, the document cites “The impact of relatively low development costs (inexpensive land, tenant-borne special assessment districts for infrastructure) at Wichita’s perimeter have a direct impact on Downtown land value and infrastructure economics.” (emphasis added)
What’s wrong with this statement? First, inexpensive land is a good thing. It means more people can afford what they want.
Second, note that people developing on the perimeter pay their own infrastructure costs. This statement hints that downtown developments won’t be expected to pay theirs.
There are just a few hopeful signs: “Indeed, WaterWalk might be struggling to fill its space because it has, simply put, hit a ceiling: it is focusing on food and fun, and perhaps there is room for only one such district (Old Town) in Downtown Wichita. The Arena could help in this regard, but until the publicly subsidized WaterWalk is a rousing success, it might not make sense to split the pie still further.”
Indeed. While we’re at it, let’s etch the names of the developers of WaterWalk on a large monument somewhere downtown, so that they are properly excluded from any further consideration as beneficiaries of the taxpayer. (Here’s the list, in case this monument isn’t built.)
But if there’s not demand for another food and fun district in Wichita, what about the promise of all the food and fun surrounding the Intrust Bank Arena? (A campaign piece from that election reads “It [the arena] will enrich our quality of life as new restaurants, shops and clubs spring up in the area …”)
It’s unknown how seriously the city council will take the steering committee’s recommendation. The council plans to vote on October 13.
In the campaign for the sales tax to build the downtown Wichita arena (Intrust Bank Arena), the idea of hosting NCAA men’s basketball games was promoted as something that would happen if voters approved the arena.
This week we learned that for this event, our arena has been rejected for the next three years.
Three arena boosters in particular — Bob Hanson of the Greater Wichita Area Sports Commission, businessman George Fahnestock, and Wichita Eagle sports columnist Bob Lutz — owe Wichita and Sedgwick County voters an apology.
As it turns out, Lutz was quite the visionary in a June 18, 2004 Wichita Eagle column, in which he wrote: “Imagine our city bidding for an NCAA Tournament subregional or the Big 12 Tournament.”
The following is a lightly edited version of an insightful comment left on this site by an unknown writer, the “Wichitator.” Since many readers don’t read comments, I’ve promoted this to a post.
Hundreds of millions have already been spent for downtown redevelopment and what do we have to show for it? In contrast, look at the benign neglect the city has had on the thriving east and west sides of town where projects on Maize and Webb roads have prospered despite heavy property taxes.
Over 20 years ago the current downtown developer of the languishing East Bank (WaterWalk) project, Jack DeBoer, provided his vision for revitalizing downtown. There was a lot of public discussion about DeBoer’s proposal including front page Wichita Eagle articles at that time. No one in the local news media wants to talk about this now apparently.
Ironically enough, at that time, DeBoer’s plan did not include the struggling East Bank (Waterwalk) project that he is currently involved in. DeBoer’s vision of downtown projects were largely implemented by taxpayers over time.
The largest and most expensive of these projects will be the Intrust Arena with its $200+ million price tag. The only one that has been partially rejected was turning the Keeper of the Plains into a 500 foot community version of a Seattle Sky Needle that one might argue was at least partially implemented when this statue was placed on a much higher pedestal at a more prominent point where the two rivers meet at high cost to city taxpayers.
Lesser downtown projects that were part of DeBoer’s plan and were a lot less expensive than the new arena, were completed years ago. This public infrastructure is now in place at a very expensive cost to taxpayers of the past few decades. Another example, Exploration Place, still has years before its mortgage will be paid off, I believe.
Where has been the return for this community? It is invisible to this taxpayer. Look at the downtown taxing district. It takes in about the same level of property tax revenues as it has always received. It is clear that there is no private sector growth downtown. So tax revenues are stagnant. This publicly funded but privately selected downtown board operates with almost no media oversight. There is some taxpayer subsidized remodeling going on but outside of that, I can only think of the Garvey Center where significant private funds are being spent on a partial remodel of their downtown property.
The philosopher George Santayana said, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Since the downtown development plans are NOT being made public it looks like we’ll soon have another, 21st century version of the 1980s DeBoer plan that the taxpayers in our community will be expected to fund. In Washington, nothing fails like excess (see GSE’s Fannie & Freddie) and in Wichita we are trying to follow in our federal masters’ footsteps. Since local government can’t print money like the political fools in Washington can through the Federal Reserve Bank, the fiscal chickens will come home to roost a lot more quickly here. Mr. Weeks is right in trying to see the details of these proposals. If we did, the price tag would probably take our collective breaths away. The downtown development folks who want to be the 21st century reincarnation of Mr. DeBoer are just as right in wanting to keep this information hidden.
A recent letter in the Wichita Eagle by Alden Wilner of Bel Aire worries that “flat, dusty and hot” parking lots in the neighborhood of the Intrust Bank Arena (formerly known as the downtown Wichita arena) in downtown Wichita will hamper downtown revitalization.
I don’t know if this claim is true or not, but I do know that the solution Wilner proposes — “an area wide light-rail system” — would be an absolute disaster for Wichita. These systems are costly to build and operate, suffer from low ridership almost everywhere they are built, and have many other problems.
In a recent article, Randal O’Toole presented the costs of light rail versus highways:
The average mile of light-rail line costs two to five times as much as an urban freeway lane-mile. Yet in 2007 the average light-rail line carried less than one-seventh as many people as the average freeway lane-mile in cities with light rail.
Do the math: Light rail costs 14 to 35 times as much to move people as highways.
The Government Accountability Office found that bus-rapid transit—frequent buses with limited stops—provided faster, better service at 2 percent of the capital cost and lower operating costs than light rail.
Light rail is the mantra of those who hate cars. They must love waste and failure in its place. Portland is an example of an area that’s built a lot of light rail in recent years. O’Toole points out that in 1980 — before the light rail building boom — 9.8 percent of the region’s commuters took transit to work. Now that number, despite the light rail building boom, has declined to 7.6 percent.
Another article by O’Toole (Light Rail Doesn’t Work) tells of the huge costs, inconvenience, congestion, misallocation of economic development, and increased energy consumption and greenhouse gas output that light rail projects produce.
This week the Wichita Eagle printed a letter submitted by Sedgwick County Commissioner Karl Peterjohn. The printed letter is quite a bit shorter than what Peterjohn submitted. The unabridged letter follows.
The Wichita Eagle editorial written by Rhonda Holman on June 29, 2009 now claims that the new Intrust Bank Arena in downtown Wichita lacks adequate parking. This is a major change by the Eagle editorial board’s position. I have repeatedly asked county staff about the available parking in and around this soon-to-open facility since I became a commissioner in January. I have been repeatedly told by county staff that adequate parking will be available when the Intrust Arena opens next year. The most recent public assurance I have received was only a few days ago.
In 2004, while I led the opposition to the proposed downtown arena in my role as the executive director of the Kansas Taxpayers Network, I repeatedly raised the parking availability issue. In 2004 the arena advocates claimed that arena parking would not become a problem and that the critics were wrong.
Voters were repeatedly assured that there was plenty of parking that would be available downtown for the arena. The Wichita Eagle editorial page was among the leading advocates for this project and ignored opponents arguments concerning this $206 million (back then it was described as a $185 million) project. At that time there was only a general area for this new facility’s location so this argument lacked specificity. The exact location was unknown when voters cast their ballots.
The Friday before the 2004 election I held a news conference pointing out the dimensions of the parking problem downtown in particular and the related location and capacity issues in great detail. At this news conference I provided a map of the Kansas Coliseum’s Britt Brown Arena and adjacent parking area available for comparison purposes with the existing 3,500 parking spaces for this 12,000 seat facility along I-135. I still have a few extra copies of this Britt Brown Arena aerial view. Arena proponents attended this 2004 news conference and claimed that the arena opponents concerns were invalid because of existing downtown parking. The Eagle editorial page repeatedly backed these arena proponents’ claims.
The 2004 election is now political history. I want the Intrust Arena to be a success because this project has now become very important to the entire community. The reservations I expressed in 2004 have not disappeared just because of time. The decision to eliminate some of the one-way streets with two-way streets will not be an improvement in traffic flow in my opinion. There will be challenges for people to become comfortable with access into and out of this new facility while participating in high attendance events when the arena opens in a few months. To get beyond this challenge for any new facility, the county staff and parking consultant need to be correct about the adequacy of parking for the Intrust Arena and I believe are working to accomplish this objective.
Kansas City’s Sprint Center (that’s their new downtown arena) is suffering from underuse.
The Atlantic article The Empty Arena tells the story. Its subtitle is “If you build it, they might not come.” Despite being managed by a well-connected and experienced management group, no professional basketball or hockey team has moved in. Here’s bit more:
For now, Kansas City remains cautiously optimistic that the decision to build the Sprint Center was an enlightened one. The taxes that fund it are largely being paid by visitors, after all, and the concerts and NCAA games it has already attracted would have bypassed the old, outdated Kemper Arena. Mayor Mark Funkhouser, formerly the city auditor, had struggled to understand how spending $222 million on an arena made economic sense. “Now that I’ve inherited it,” he says, “I tell people it’s a shotgun wedding, but I have to make the marriage work. And if you look at it just in terms of the performance of the facility itself, it has exceeded expectations. It’s shiny and new. People like it.”
Who paid for the arena? As the snippit above approvingly states, someone else besides the people of Kansas City did. $222 million from hotel and car-rental taxes funded the arena.
In Wichita, the Intrust Bank Arena (formerly known as the downtown Wichita arena), set to open next year, was paid for largely by its own hometown, as it was funded through a sales tax.
The Wichita arena, unlike Kansas City’s, has a tenant, a minor league hockey team. Even though the arena is owned by the citizens of Sedgwick County, details are kept secret from the people.
A few months ago in March, SMG, the company that is managing the Intrust Bank Arena (formerly known as the downtown Wichita arena) signed a lease with the Wichita Thunder Hockey team.
Details of that lease weren’t made available to the public. Not to Sedgwick County Commissioners, either. So the public and even elected government officials don’t know anything about this contract, except for its term of five years.
This strikes me as bad government. The county has a deal with SMG that gives the management company broad latitude in operating the arena, including some profit-and-loss responsibility.
The arena, however, is still taxpayer-owned property. Furthermore, reading the management contract between SMG and Sedgwick County, I can see several ways in which SMG can wrangle free of its obligations. Believe me, the taxpayer is still on the hook.
An inquiry sent to Assistant Sedgwick County Manager Ron Holt, the county’s point man for the arena, produced a response (see below) that indicates that the county has no intention of disclosing the terms of this lease agreement. Citizens must simply trust the county.
Part of the problem is that the arena has a competitor in the private sector, the newly-opened Hartman Arena. SMG is justifiably concerned about its contracts with tenants, which it considers proprietary information.
That’s fair enough — if SMG was a private company. But it’s one-half of a public-private partnership. It gets to use an asset valued at roughly $200 million, provided at no charge by the taxpayers of Sedgwick County, to see if it can earn a profit for itself. Our stake in this means we should get a look. The fact that SMG and the county will not disclose means that citizens will always wonder about the details of the deal.
This is especially true when government competes with private industry. Holt is already on record as being opposed to the privately-held Hartman Arena, remarking “overall, it would not be in the best interest of the community.”
Without disclosure, there will always be questions. It would be in the best public relations interest of SMG to agree for public disclosure of the terms of the Wichita Thunder lease.
Bob Weeks Inquiry The Thunder – SMG Lease May, 2009 Issue # 1: Since SMG has committed to a contract/lease agreement with the Thunder in which there is a major revenue stream for the facility and with terms greater than one year, does the County have to approve the Thunder contract/lease agreement? Response: No, the County does not have to approve the Thunder contract/lease agreement because it is in the sole discretion of the Contract Administrator whether or not to approve the agreement, and even then such approval cannot be unreasonably withheld. It is important to understand that there are two types of contracts covered by section 2.3 (c) of the agreement—contracts that involve paying money out (Section 2.3 (c) i), and contracts involving a revenue stream for SMG (Section 2.3 (c) ii). Contracts that involve paying money out, such as a contract to provide security for the facility, must be approved in writing by the County if it involves a term beyond the management term of SMG. As will be discussed later, this approval can be a simple letter from the Contract Administrator and such approval cannot be unreasonably withheld. The Thunder agreement involves a revenue stream and Section 2.3 (c) ii provides that “SMG and the County will have joint approval rights (which approval right shall be at each party’s sole discretion, not to be unreasonably withheld) for all major revenue streams that can impact the profitability of any Facility …with terms of greater than one year.” Section 2.1 (d) provides that “to the extent that the approval of the County is required under the terms of this Agreement, the written approval of the Contract Administrator shall constitute the approval of the County,” Under the definitions in Section 1, the “Contract Administrator” is defined as – the senior administrative official of the County as from time to time appointed by the County Manager, or such individual person as may from time to time be authorized in writing by such administrative official to act fro him/her with respect to any or all matters pertaining to this Agreement. So to address the first issue, it is in the discretion of the Contract Administrator whether or not to approve the agreement with the Thunder. This approval could take many forms and could be established by policies within the County Manager’s Office. While the initial review of the Thunder contract/lease agreement was limited to a discussion between the Contract Administrator and the SMG’s General Manager, subsequently a more thorough review by the Contract Administrator and an Assistant County Counselor with the SMG General Manager revealed the following notable provisions of the agreement: 1.) The term of the agreement is for 10 ½ years with provisions to terminate in the event of default by either party. 2.) There is a provision for a base rental that we agree is standard in the market with accelerators for future years based upon established indicators. 3.) There are other provisions in the agreement for revenue to be derived by SMG to cover staffing costs and other maintenance considerations. 4.) There is appropriate insurance coverage to protect the operator of the facility. After such subsequent review it is our opinion that the agreement provides adequate protection for the County for the entire term of the agreement and there is no reasonable basis for exercising our discretion to disapprove the agreement. For future contracts/lease agreements that fall under the conditions of the SMG Agreement as identified above, the Contract Administrator will meet with the SMG General Manager of the INTRUST Bank Arena and review any agreement in order to understand the terms and conditions of the agreement and how this might affect the County’s interest. Issue # 2: How can Sedgwick County give its approval to a contract/lease agreement that SMG will not let the county see (wouldn’t approval in a meaningful way mean that the commissioners and the public can read the contract/lease agreement)? Response: Obviously the County can’t give meaningful approval to a contract that we can’t see, but our agreement with SMG specifically allows us to review any agreement in order to understand the terms and conditions of the agreement and how this might affect the County’s interest. See Section 2.6 (a) (i) which provides:. (i) To the extent that SMG has any confidential or proprietary information that it reasonably believes is a privileged trade secret and/or should not be disclosed to a third party to protect the privileged, confidential and/or proprietary nature of such information, and upon the approval of the Contract Administrator, which shall not be unreasonably withheld, SMG shall not be required hereunder to deliver such information to the County, but instead, will afford the County an opportunity to review such information at the Facility during reasonable business hours and upon reasonable advance notice, or on terms mutually agreed upon by the parties in order to protect the privileged, confidential and/or proprietary nature of such information. As mentioned above, we have had the opportunity to review this agreement with SMG in a meeting with the General Manager of the Intrust Bank Arena. In our negotiations with SMG, we intended to give SMG significant authority to run the business of the new arena as they deem necessary as a means for them to sign off on an agreement that puts the risk of losses solely on them. The only reason we wanted the authority to review/approve long term agreements was for the purpose of making sure that SMG wasn’t putting the County in a bad financial position for years that they might not be operating the arena. While initially this is a five year agreement, we have provisions in the agreement that will automatically extend the agreement for an additional five years if they meet certain performance criteria. In other words, there is no reason at this point in our business dealings to think that SMG is operating in anything but the best interest of SMG and the County and such there would be little reason to formally approve the Thunder agreement – let alone have a reasonable basis to withhold approval. With Hartman Arena and Sprint Center (non SMG operated facilities) as competitors in this market, it is of high importance to SMG of keeping their proprietary information from being disclosed publicly. In addition, the County’s financial interest is protected with a provision in the agreement requiring SMG to maintain a system of bookkeeping adequate for its operations and for the use of our auditors. SMG is furthermore required to give the County’s authorized representative access to such books and records. The County has the right at any time, and from time to time, to audit and/or cause nationally recognized independent auditors to audit all the books of SMG relating to the operating revenues and operating expenses of the arena.
A letter in today’s Wichita Eagle places a lot of faith on things not yet seen, and in things we know don’t work.
“I think it is dumb that people are complaining about the new Intrust Bank Arena. It will bring money and tourists to Wichita, not to mention great entertainment. That means more money brought to our government, and that’s a good thing. — Caleb Beeson, Wichita”
First, since the Intrust Bank Arena is not yet open, it has no track record. We have absolutely no idea how well it will do, financially or otherwise. A lot of people think it’s “dumb” to count chickens before eggs have hatched.
Then, there’s this letter writer’s idea that more money in the hands of government is a “good thing.”
To believe that paying taxes to the government is good requires believing that government spends wisely. There’s little evidence of that.
Perhaps the writer means that when tourists from out of town travel to Wichita and spend money, our local government will be gathering tax revenue from out of our area. Better to tax someone else than ourselves — that’s the underlying message.
These taxes serve to suppress travel to cities that levy them. How does it feel to have a city add 13% to the cost of your hotel room, as I have paid in some cities? Or how do you think travelers feel when a city levies fees and charges that add 26% to the cost of renting a car, as some places do?
Since demand falls with rising prices, these high taxes reduce demand for travel to high-tax cities. Probably worse than that, they leave a bitter aftertaste for those who pay them. Do we want travelers to Wichita to feel that they’ve been soaked by our local taxes? They won’t feel good about coming back again.
Education’s Ground Zero (Nicholas D. Kristof in The New York Times) Describes the efforts of Washington D.C. public schools chancellor Michelle Rhee to reform the system. She’s fired one-third of the principals. Kristof reminds us of the importance of teachers: “The reform camp is driven partly by research suggesting that great teachers are far more important to student learning than class size, school resources or anything else. One study suggests that if black kids could get teachers from the profession’s most effective quartile for four years in a row, the achievement gap would disappear.” In Wichita, however, USD 259 is taking the opposite approach.
Details of Intrust Bank Arena contract with Thunder are a secret (Bill Wilson in the Wichita Eagle) This is an earlier story, interesting for the confusion it raises or exposes, I’m not sure which. Reported in the story: “The arena’s financial performance would be monitored by the county through what [Sedgwick County assistant manager Ron] Holt characterized as limited records access. But [Sedgwick County Commissioner Gwen] Welshimer said she didn’t know how the county would track the arena’s financial performance. ‘We don’t have any access to their books that I know of,’ she said.” Read the county’s contract with SMG, however, and you learn that SMG will maintain accounting records, have them audited, and give Sedgwick County access to them “upon reasonable advance notice.” Also, the county has the right to audit the records at any time.
Why state smoking ban seems inevitable Rhonda Holman in the Wichita Eagle Editorial Blog) In this post, Wichita Eagle editorialist Rhonda Holman makes explicit the connection between state-paid health care and the state’s interest in controlling behavior: “That’s [passing the statewide smoking ban] the only responsible action the Legislature can take, given the increasing cost burden of smoking-related illnesses on the state …” If the state (that includes the U.S. Federal government) starts taking responsibility for more health care, smoking bans are just the start of state meddling in behavior.
Minnesota Guys ready to start face-lifts of downtown Wichita buildings (Bill Wilson in Wichita Eagle) Real Development starts work on the improvement of facades of some of its buildings. In the article developer Michael Elzufon manages to use the word “iconic” twice. This article doesn’t tell how these improvements are paid for: a confusing arrangement where the city loans money and recoups it in special assessment taxes. A hefty development fee is being paid to the developers, which allows them to profit for fixing up their own buildings. But they’ll pay that back in the form of the special taxes — or will they? It’s hard to tell where the money is going in these agreements. This benefits developers like Elzufon and politicians on the Wichita city council, as if citizens knew what was really going on, they wouldn’t be happy.