Quote:
Originally Posted by rrskylar
If this thing doesn't fly does the city get left holding the bag? I don't trust our city politicians with any deal involving tax dollars as we've seen time and time again!
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I'm not sure I see the "bag holding" risk.
One risk to the city is that T1DC doesn't build the project up and generate the property and commercial tax revenue. Let's say they don't get a lot of interest in the planned commercial units. But realistically, the city faces the exact same risk from other properties. For instance the old football stadium was meant to be used for tons of commercial and retail development generating tons of tax revenues... instead it's a former Target now a call centre and a giant vacant lot/surface parking.
The other risk is that this adds to our infrastructure debt. New developments don't always really pay for themselves in the long run even when the city is collecting every last penny of tax revenue (versus 65 cents on the dollar). If the cost of servicing the site and providing all the contracted municipal services is long term more than they're taking in in revenues, that's a risk. But again, that's the same risk as when the city allows new suburban developments out near the perimeter. Maybe a bit worse because they're only getting 65% of the tax revenues, but maybe a bit better because they don't have the full range of services to provide, just the contracted ones, and because it's being built in an existing area with existing infrastructure, not a suburban greenfield.