I would like to thank Harlan Crow for his effort to allow the citizens of Dallas to have a say in the city’s proposal to build a convention center hotel. I would also like to thank Anne Raymond for tirelessly debating the issue and educating voters. I have been in her position before, and it is a grueling, challenging task.

I have consistently voted against the city-owned hotel because I disagree with its funding mechanism which places the risk solely on the shoulders of taxpayers, with no developer or operator funds at risk.

But today, the voters of Dallas have spoken and settled the matter. After assessing the risks, a majority of voters decided that the potential benefits of a city-owned hotel outweigh the risk to taxpayers. The City of Dallas will now finance, construct, and own a convention center hotel.

As we move forward with the construction of this hotel, we must make sure that its financial success is our number one goal, and that taxpayers are not required to make up any cost overruns or revenue shortfalls. We must also be diligent to ensure that the ancillary economic development promised along with the hotel materializes and enhances our tax base. And finally, we must make sure that the hotel has sufficient connectivity to the rest of downtown so that all areas of our city center may benefit from its construction.

In the days ahead, I pledge my support to the Mayor and our Council in the pursuit of these important goals.

I won’t use the word “sham” because it’s loaded and a little heavy-handed. But here’s what happened:

There was an open house from 4pm – 7pm, when the public could wander around inside the Dallas Convention Center Arena, gander at maps and charts and such, and ask questions of NTTA and TXDOT staff.

At 7pm, the public hearing portion of the evening was to begin. Well, that’s what the flyer said, but that’s not exactly what happened. From 7pm-8:40pm, we were treated to a mind-numbing barrage of slides and information presented by staff, none of which was new to anyone who’s been watching this issue.

After the slideshow, there was a 20 minute intermission.

After that, elected and appointed officials got to speak (I spoke and so did Michael Morris of the North Central Texas Council of Governments).

THEN, finally, at about 9:15 or so, the public got to speak. By this time, more than half the crowd had left, exhausted and drained.

The night was best summed up by former Councilmember John Loza, who so eloquently explains:

“[A]s one who attended last night, the arena wasn’t the only Soviet-style aspect. The whole meeting itself was like a Soviet version of “letting the people speak”. Two and a half hours of eye-glazing, ass-numbing bureaucratic speak followed by a chance for us poor plebes to speak for three minutes while being glared at by one of the bureaucrats herself.

This is the type of thing that turns people off to government. This seemed like such a sham (yeah, I said it). Just going through the motions to be able to tick off the “held public hearing” box on the federal government’s transportation application.

If the goal was to get as much public input as possible, here’s what should have happened: They should have done the slidewhow from 5pm to 6:30pm so that the people who wanted that info could have gotten it. The public hearing, where actual, public comment was taken, should have started at 6:30pm so those of us who just wanted to put our comment into the public record could do so some time before midnight. Most importantly, they should have publicized the agenda and explained ahead of time how the meeting was going to work.

First, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced that Dallas’ levees failed to meet their new, post-Katrina safety standards. The Corps also discovered sand in our levees, which presents a problem for toll road construction. Further, the Corps indicated concerns about allowing the toll road’s large concrete piers to pierce the levees, which could weaken them.

In addition, the North Texas Tollway Authority acknowledged that there is a billion dollar funding gap for the toll road. No additional funding sources have been identified.

Despite these serious problems, the city refuses to consider other locations for the toll road that would allow us to move forward on other long-delayed aspects of the Trinity Project, including critical levee improvements, the highly anticipated Trinity Park, and the desperately-needed reconstruction of S.M. Wright Freeway.

If you are concerned about the city’s decision to construct the Trinity Toll Road in our floodway, you will have the opportunity to make your voice heard. The federal government has yet to sign off on this location, and part of their analysis includes public input.

At 7 p.m. on Tuesday, May 5, the North Texas Tollway Authority and the Texas Department of Transportation will hold a public hearing at the Dallas Convention Center Arena (650 S. Griffin St., Dallas, 75202). I hope you will plan to attend and speak on this issue. (There is no need to sign up ahead of time.)

The part of Central Expressway we’re talking about is not the elevated portion, but the part that is a city street in Downtown. From Commerce to the Farmers Market, Central is a nice two-way boulevard with a green, treed median. But from Commerce to Live Oak, the street narrows and becomes one-way, creating a complicated and arguably dangerous entry to Downtown.

The new alignment will remove part of Pearl Street that divides a Downtown park, and widen Central to create a two-way boulevard. Rather than moving forward with the proposed alignment (which was 9 lanes of concrete), I asked Downtown Dallas and Larry Good to help redesign the road to make it greener and more pedestrian-friendly. Thanks to their help, we now have a better entry to Downtown, and an expanded park.

	[mappress]

The new law makes it illegal for children to be in public between the hours of 9am and 2pm on weekdays (there are several defenses: being accompanied by parent, school wasn’t in session, etc.). The purpose of the law is to punish truants with fines of up to $500. State law prevents schools from imposing fines or otherwise penalizing students until they have committed 10 offenses. Supporters argue that a daytime curfew will reduce juvenile crime.

While I understand the motivation of those supporting this ordinance, I cannot support a curfew that criminalizes children being in public places. I also cannot support an ordinance that will further burden our police when they are struggling to respond to serious 911 calls. Furthermore, because Dallas has dozens and dozens of private and public schools, all with their own calendars and holidays, imposing a juvenile daytime curfew will prove an administrative nightmare for police.

The daytime curfew is unnecessary. If the purpose is to get truants off the street, the police already have the authority to stop truants and taken them back to their schools.

I voted against the nighttime curfew (it passed 13-1). The council unanimously delayed the daytime curfew decision to May 13.

The Mayor (along with Ron Natinsky) has told voters that without a hotel, the convention center itself is going to be a drain on Dallas taxpayers, costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. That is simply not true.

According to Sam Merten at the Observer, the Mayor and Ron Natinsky have been stating unequivocally that the convention center will cost taxpayers $150M – $300M if we don’t have a city-owned hotel:

At a Bachman Recreation Center debate in early March, Leppert said the convention center is uncompetitive for three reasons, one of which is because it loses $3 million per year.

“That comes right out of your wallets my friends because that comes out of the general fund. Three million dollars. And that number’s not going to go down,” he said. “Keep in mind, that’s your tax money. So as that gets worse and worse and worse, we’ve got to get better. It’s not unreasonable to believe over the next 30 years, it’s going to be over $150 million in taxpayers’ money if we don’t do something.”

Council member Ron Natinsky debated at the Farmers Branch Recreation Center in late February and made a similar claim. “If you take $5 million over the 30 years of the program on the hotel, that’s $150 million that I can stand here and tell you we are absolutely going to lose — if not more,” he said.

Natinsky ramped up the scare tactics by doubling that amount, claiming “our convention people” estimate the convention center will lose approximately $10 million annually.

“Well, $10 million a year of your taxpayer money is $300 million at the end of 30 years, and we will lose that,” he said. “We made a decision that the risk of losing $300 million is significantly larger than the risk that we calculated on the other side.”

That’s just not true. This morning I asked Dave Cook, City of Dallas Chief Financial Officer, if this was correct. Here is his answer:

We do not anticipate a need to subsidize the Convention Center operations. The convention center debt restructure greatly reduced the chances that a general fund subsidy would be needed. Following the debt restructure, Convention Center has returned the FY 2008-09 subsidy and the plan is to return the prior subsidies (Fy 2006-07 and FY 2007-08) to the general fund next year. That will “undo” all General Fund subsidies. I have heard of no scenario that would now require a $10M (or any other) general fund subsidy to Convention Center.

So why are the Mayor and Ron Natinsky lying to voters? Again?

If we’re going to play “who loves Dallas more,” then a fair argument can be made that hotel proponents who claim the sky will fall without a city-owned hotel are actually anti-Dallas. They see nothing beneficial or desirable about our city except huge, expensive projects (Calatrava bridges, Trinity toll roads, convention center hotels). They think so little of Dallas and what we have to offer that they desperately throw money at any unnecessary (but flashy) project just to convince people we’re a decent city. Whatever your position on the hotel, our city has much more to offer than the Mayor and others give it credit for, and we don’t need a hotel or any other massive, taxpayer-funded monument to excess to prove it.

Councilmember Koop and I traveled to Portland and Seattle last weekend to tour each city’s streetcar system and bicycle infrastructure. Assistant City Manager A.C. Gonzalez (who oversees economic development) and Jay Kline (DART’s streetcar coordinator) joined us.

STREETCARS
Both cities have used streetcars as economic catalysts, allowing considerable mixed-use development in depressed areas. The Pearl District in Portland is a great example. Only a few years ago, it was a run-down, crime-ridden warehouse district. Today, it’s a vibrant, clean, mixed-use community with businesses and residences.

Seattle just invested in its first streetcar line, working to accomplish the same thing Portland did. So far, the investment is paying dividends, with a billion dollars of investment popping up along the line.

The streetcar tool can be used in the same way in Dallas. We just have to figure out a way to fund it. I think a Tax Increment Financing District is on the right track, but TIFs have to generate money via economic growth in order to throw off future dollars. And “future” is the key. We need some start-up money NOW to get the line(s) rolling (so to speak), and that really can’t be TIF dollars since those are future dollars. We’re currently working on how we can structure this, but I think we’ve got some real buy-in now that our folks have gotten to talk with out-of-town developers who have created remarkable growth in other cities, and whose developments would not have existed but for the streetcar lines.

BICYCLE INFRASTRUCTURE

Both cities have made significant investments in their bicycle infrastructure. As Dallas becomes more dense, we need to do the same thing. Portland and Seattle recognize that there are different levels of riders, a small percentage who’ll ride anywhere (they’d ride on Central if they could) and at the other end of the spectrum, those who won’t ride anywhere, for any reason. In the middle, there’s a large percentage of people who would ride if there were some level of protection or distance from cars. Portland and Seattle have worked to accommodate both the confident riders and those who want a little more protection. As Dallas moves forward on updating its bike plan (Sheffie and I are chairs), we will explore these different options, and hopefully do some demonstration areas.

I’ll have pictures up later today….

In theory, the hotel would be able to pay for itself through its own revenue. But if the hotel doesn’t meet the Mayor’s rosy projections for occupancy, taxpayers get stuck with the bill. So I am voting YES on Proposition 1.

I am voting NO on Proposition 2, which will essentially call for a referendum whenever the city provides more than $1 million in financial incentives for a development.

There are areas of our city that need incentives to convince developers to build there, and developers won’t stick around for a public vote. They’ll simply go elsewhere — Las Colinas, Irving, McKinney — where they can get the same incentives without waiting months for a vote. Bottom line is, Prop 2 has the potential to make Dallas non-competitive and seriously damage our city’s ability to provide reasonable economic incentives to businesses.

UPDATED:
On another website, someone posted “So many things would have to go wrong for this hotel to use taxpayer funds.” Not really. Just missing a mortgage payment could force the city to dip into taxpayer debt.

While the hotel debt is initially secured by hotel revenue, it is also secured by taxpayer dollars. Apparently, the market didn’t feel comfortable betting solely on the hotel, so it required additional security — in the form of taxpayer funds. So here’s how it works:

The city’s going to borrow $550 million for the hotel: $500 million to build it and $50 million to set aside in a rainy day fund (the “reserve account”). The reserve account protects bondholders so they know they’ll get repaid — the city can dip into this reserve account if the revenues for the hotel aren’t enough to repay the debt.

If it ended there, I’d be supporting the city-owned hotel, but it doesn’t. The reserve account has to stay at $50 million to satisfy bondholders. Guess who has to keep the reserve account full? Well, if the hotel doesn’t have enough money to pay its mortgage, it surely won’t be able to refill the reserve account. So that will fall on taxpayers. It’s really not that complicated, or that unlikely.

This city-owned hotel is a gamble, and in this economy, it doesn’t make sense for the city to be putting taxpayers at risk.

Please help improve this ordinance by taking part in an upcoming public meeting:

April 20, 2009
3:00 pm to 5:00 pm
Dallas City Hall, 1500 Marilla, L1/F/North Auditorium

I don’t know why this was scheduled during the day (I hold most if not all public meetings at night to accommodate working people), but maybe a daytime meeting works alright for most people. If you attend the meeting, I welcome your input about whether it was productive.