For the past two weeks, I have researched how Pensacola and Escambia County have studied sports tourism, indoor sports facilities and meeting facilities for the past eight years.
- I have also read the numerous viewpoints printed in the daily newspaper and listened to the Tourist Development Council’s special meeting on the proposed indoor sports facility at Ashton Brosnaham Park and improvements to the Pensacola Bay Center.
I found many of the arguments against the Pensacola Sports proposal are very similar to those used nearly 20 years ago to fight the Community Maritime Park. In my Outtakes – “We Heard This Before,” I wrote about some of them, including leaders saying they were surprised about the recent study and wanted more hearings:
When Quint Studer and the late Adm. Jack Fetterman presented the Community Maritime Park to the Pensacola City Council, Marty Donovan and others protested that the plans were developed behind closed doors. They accused Studer and Fetterman of working the park while others helped the community recover from Hurricane Ivan.
Donovan and his cadre demanded more public hearings and studies. When the study and hearings were completed, they refused to accept the results. They continued to fight the downtown baseball park and even pushed the state attorney’s office to investigate its proponents for violating the state’s Sunshine laws.
Read more.
I greatly respect Councilman Casey Jones and TDC member Jim Reeves, the last surviving member of the DeLuna expedition, but the facts repute several of their arguments. I will present them tomorrow.
The Blue Wahoos Stadium and Community Maritime Park were built with CRA bond money. The fifth-cent was added to bed tax to fund a bond something like what is being proposed. The studies show how much input has been gathered since 2015. The dysfunction is in the hospitality and tourism industries, not at the county commission. I will explain what I mean in a later post.
What do you prefer Rick? Or what do you think is the right way to spend $60million dollars of tax money?
How many questions would you ask, how much due diligence would you do if I wanted $60,000 of your personal dollars to invest?
We gotta remember most Commissioners are not business owners, they are politicians, and when they want to spend millions without seeking thoughts and ideas from people who have actually invested millions in the community only to fuel personal pats on their backs, and will also end up creating an additional loss that has to be paid by more taxes… those can’t be compared to Quint who spent his own money not tax payers!
It’s easy to spend other people’s money, and exactly why David Bear said he wouldn’t invest his own money in a facility out on 10mile but than voted in favor of it…wonder why that is?