To achieve the economic impact touted during the MAPS3 campaign by a new convention center there will have to be substantial additional investment of taxpayer dollars. This was outlined clearly in a study by Convention Sports and Leisure in 2009 prior to the MAPS3 campaign which indicated that a 600 room hotel would be required and that no city in recent memory had been able to accomplish such a task without massive public subsidies. Despite my repeated requests, this study has yet to be released to the public. This study advocates for $250 million to be spent in phase one (discussed in MAPS3) along with the taxpayers largely or completely the funding a hotel and then investing an additional $150 million for a convention center expansion. In addition, the current $250 million budget does not include taxpayer money for parking which could run in the $50 million range. The taxpayers in Nashville just invested $128 million plus a 62.5% property tax decrease for 20 years to make their convention center hotel deal with Omni work. Ask yourself this question: if you buy a car for $25,000 and are told that it is going to do certain things and then afterwards learn that you have to buy special tires for $10,000 and two engine components for another $15,000 and $5,000 in order to realize those promises, would you feel misled? If the salesman said "we didn't talk about it or that you would have to buy it but we showed you a picture that had the tires in it" would that be acceptable to you? Would you feel you had a valid contract with the salesman?
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