Thursday, October 21, 1999
Stadium dollars out for The Banks
BY LUCY MAY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The people pushing to create a new waterfront neighborhood called The Banks need to start shopping for another $56 million.
Hamilton County commissioners Bob Bedinghaus and John Dowlin on Wednesday rejected the use of stadium sales-tax dollars to help fund The Banks.
“I cannot anticipate a way that the sales-tax money could be used for The Banks,” Mr. Bedinghaus said.
Hamilton County voters in 1996 approved a half-cent increase in the county sales tax to fund stadium construction. With the “buyer's remorse” voters already have over the stadium project, using stadium sales-tax revenues for The Banks would be unwise, Mr. Dowlin said.
The Cincinnati Riverfront Advisory Commission wanted county commissioners to agree to use stadium sales tax proceeds to pay off $56 million in what is called “subordinate debt.”
Without the support of at least two of the three county commissioners, The Banks' $248 million funding plan has a $56 million hole.
Riverfront Advisory Commission Chairman Jack Rouse was traveling and could not be reached Wednesday. But he and other commission members have said that the funding ideas they recommended with their plan should be viewed as a concept that must be tweaked before the final solution is found.
Mr. Bedinghaus said he's certain community leaders will find a way to fund The Banks, which calls for building condos, apartments and shops atop parking garages to be built between the new Reds ballpark and the Bengals' new Paul Brown Stadium.
“Simply because the sales tax money isn't available doesn't mean it isn't a development plan we ought to be looking at,” he said. “People who want to move this community forward need to sit down and figure out how to pay for it.”
And they probably ought to do the math without the county.
“Our plate's pretty full,” Mr. Bedinghaus said when asked if any other county resources might be available for the project. “It's not as if we haven't contributed anything here.”
Indeed, the county is using stadium sales-tax proceeds to fund the bulk of the $404 million football stadium, a new $299 million Reds ballpark and $135 million for the parking garages.
The total $248 million cost of The Banks, in fact, includes that $135 million that the county already has committed for parking.
It also includes $15 million for utilities, which the city and county are funding.
The advisory commission recommended the other $98 million be funded by:
• $6 million from the private developer or developers selected for the project.
• $56 million in bonds to be paid off using stadium sales-tax revenues, which the county has rejected.
• $36 million from taxes generated by the project itself. Known as tax-increment financing, with a city vote, it can be put back into the project.
Cincinnati City Council members have reacted favorably to the idea of using tax-increment financing, but they have not voted on it.
Mr. Dowlin said while the city decides whether to use tax-increment financing, two-thirds of the taxes that would be invested into the project would otherwise go to the county, not the city.
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