Convention project requires leadership

On one issue, people all across Spokane County's fractured political landscape can agree: We need to strengthen our economy. Doing so will help the poor, the charitable groups, laborers, professionals, all of the government agencies and all of the business interests including those that are at odds.

Our economy grows when dollars flow in from other areas.

There are several ways to attract outside dollars. Each one deserves support.

One way now hangs in the balance: The proposal to expand convention facilities. This would enable our area to compete with other metropolitan areas, in a higher market tier where gatherings are larger and more lucrative than those we now can attract.

A significantly stronger convention business could prove crucial to the Davenport Hotel project, for example. Walt Worthy is investing a fortune to save that beloved building but when he is done he needs a viable business. He needs guests to fill those new hotel rooms in a building that has been dormant. Its reopening will enlarge the supply of rooms. What about the demand for rooms?

A significantly stronger convention trade likewise could benefit Don Barbieri's fine inns along the river.

It could help the Doubletree, located next to the proposed convention center expansion. And other hotels and motels, as well.

It could help downtown retailing, restaurants, theaters, the unfolding Davenport arts district and the growing sense of safety and vitality spreading through our city center at night.

The convention center proposal extends beyond downtown. It would feature major upgrades to the county fairgrounds, also a thriving site for trade shows and meetings. It could invest millions in facilities still to be identified in the Spokane Valley, such as a recreational sports complex.

Everything depends, however, on whether city and county leaders will work together - rapidly. Business leaders as well as elected officials. Leaders whose interests and egos, frankly, have clashed in the past. Leaders who have been better at bickering about problems than at solving them.

Tonight, the Spokane City Council will consider a resolution that would, at last, hand to a proven public entity the responsibility for this project. The Public Facilities District runs our Arena and has done a good job. Last month, its board unanimously agreed to broaden its mission to include more than that one facility. State law makes it possible for the PFD to fund additional convention facilities. The PFD could retain more of the state sales taxes collected here and it could leave in place, for a longer time, the current taxes that financed the Arena.

Voters would have to agree, before this could happen. Also, the PFD board would have to decide what new facilities, exactly, should be constructed. Wisely, the resolution before the Council passes along to the PFD board some seed money, to invite designs for the two convention center options that have emerged from a long evaluation process. It will put the PFD board in a stronger negotiating position, to have a couple of attractive, competing options.

Time, however, is short. State funding, crucial to the project, will vanish if nothing's done by Dec. 31, 2002. Several tough decisions lie ahead.

Tonight, the City Council and Mayor John Powers have a chance to show that they can lead us forward. Soon, the County Commissioners, the PFD board and local business executives will have the same opportunity. The community is watching.

Copyright 2001 Cowles Publishing Company
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