Convention Central

Update, Thursday 8am: The Chronicle-Herald is reporting that Saturday’s deadline has been extended for three months: http://bit.ly/hQ9JFq Developer Joe Ramia says that this Saturday, January 15, is the deadline for the three levels of government to agree to finance the convention centre he proposes to build in downtown Halifax. Weeks ago, Halifax city council and […]

[image-1] The city and province have signed a deal for financing for the proposed convention centre, Infrastructure minister Bill Estabrooks and mayor Peter Kelly announced today. The short of the agreement: the city completely backed down on two negotiating points, and nearly completely backed down on a third. As a result, the city faces potentially unlimited risk for funding continued convention centre operations, faces a potential $12 million to purchase the existing convention centre and has agreed to a confusing property tax formula that reduces city revenues from standard property tax assessments on commercial properties. The new deal is still

There’s still no deal between the city and province for financing the proposed new convention centre. Halifax council rejected a “compromise” offer from the province Tuesday, and sent staff negotiators back to the province with a counter offer. Council met in secret for over five hours Tuesday, the bulk of the time discussing the convention […]

Halifax council is having an all-day meeting about all things convention centre. I’m live-blogging it via Twitter, at @twitcoast. Later today, I’ll have a blog post recapping the day. Related Stories

Mayor Peter Kelly says he met three times with Joe Ramia, the developer of the convention centre proposed for downtown, during a period when prospective developers were to be disqualified from the project if they discussed it with city officials. But none of those meetings were improper, says Kelly. In 2008, the province and city […]

We have touched on the documents behind the convention centre proposal before. Part 2 and Part 3 of this series looked at the new jobs and tax dollars that are supposed to come with a new convention centre—what the consultants’ reports say the benefits will be, and how centre supporters overstate these benefits. Those earlier […]

The provincial government dropped two bombshells on Halifax council Tuesday. The deal in the works for the new convention centre proposed for downtown includes two provisos: that the city exempt the new convention centre from property taxes, and that the city buy the existing World Trade and Convention Centre. Either or both proviso could kill […]

One of the most bizarre arguments in favour of the proposed convention centre is that it will increase tax revenues. “Generating perpetual tax revenue for the federal, provincial and municipal governments, a new convention centre will help fund valuable provincial infrastructure like roads, schools and hospitals,” says an online petition, echoing sentiments expressed by any […]

Convention centre supporters are consistently touting about the job-creation potential of the proposed convention centre. “A new convention centre could result in as many as 12,000 new jobs,” says Infrastructure minister Bill Estabrooks. “A shadow bid prepared by Deloitte…estimates the project will add $893 million to economic output, $171 million in taxes and 28,000 jobs […]

No alternative uses for the public money have been suggested, and the alternative proposals for a convention centre were discarded without public explanation. Moreover, the proposed public/private arrangement is a disservice to the public, giving us a crappy convention centre for the money, and handing a huge bill to the future.