Last Chance To STOP The Event Center.

[Detector]

Perhaps my passion of our history is clouding my view but I prefer to think it gives me better perception of its potential.

The same was thought of Las Vegas. It was in the middle of nowhere, poor roads and small airport. When addressing the same question as to its seclusion those with vision replied "Yes, it is in the middle of nowhere isn't it." Some saw this as a plus and have adopted the motto "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas."

From a historical junkie's view I also see our location as a plus. If I were to visit historical Dodge City I would expect it to be secluded. In the days of old Dodge City was the last stop in the middle of nowhere. While we have lost a lot of our local history we still maintain our isolation that I feel would be as big of draw today as it was back then.

A trip to famous Dodge City would today, as it did back then, requires a trip down the infamous Santa Fe Trail. To tourists with a passion for history this would simply be the icing on the cake.

"Where are the tourists coming from" you ask? The key word here is tourists. Why would people from nearby states want to drive all the way to Dodge City when they have their own casinos? The casinos to the east would draw more local patrons? The better question would be why would we want to draw local and surrounding area gamblers? The weekend gambler is also the majority of the "bad element" of gambling. We want to target tourists not the weekend gambler.

Again I say Dodge City stands alone in its potential for tourism.

Dodge City has more to gain and less to lose than any other area being considered. Our dual packing plants have given us a cesspool of social problems. I honestly believe the social problems of 2 such plants, and a city willing to roll out the immigrant red carpet, are far worse than any gambling could be. Of course it needs to be done right. That is to say we need to use our gambling draw for good and not evil. Evil being locals and good being tourists.

I see tourists coming to dodge as a central hub on a western themed vacation. From here they could be a short distance from many other historical sites. Famous Englewood as well as the Dalton hideout to name just a few. What fan of western history wouldn't love driving down the old Santa Fe Trail for a stay at Dodge City and a bit of gambling? Possibly the last chance to visit a rapidly vanishing real western frontier. If done right, gambling could well be our salvation.

[lurker]

Originally Posted by Detector

Perhaps my passion of our history is clouding my view but I prefer to think it gives me better perception of its potential.

The same was thought of Las Vegas. It was in the middle of nowhere, poor roads and small airport. When addressing the same question as to its seclusion those with vision replied "Yes, it is in the middle of nowhere isn't it." Some saw this as a plus and have adopted the motto "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas."

From a historical junkie's view I also see our location as a plus. If I were to visit historical Dodge City I would expect it to be secluded. In the days of old Dodge City was the last stop in the middle of nowhere. While we have lost a lot of our local history we still maintain our isolation that I feel would be as big of draw today as it was back then.

A trip to famous Dodge City would today, as it did back then, requires a trip down the infamous Santa Fe Trail. To tourists with a passion for history this would simply be the icing on the cake.

Vegas owes a huge debt of gratitude to Castro.....

[TexKan]

There are plenty of sucess stories in Louisanna. They don't have major airports - when you are talking ONE casino type operation - they don't come in on Lear Jets........ busses will do and the money and improvements will follow - I think. It's bound to be better than the slope Dodge is on now. What can it hurt? I know all about the evils and cost of casinos what I'm talkin about is Dodge was willing to take a chance on the meat packing business and supported it. Why in the world is it so hard to support a different type of business that has shown to be much more successful and positive than the meat packers turned out to be? Packers bring in money but they forgot to tell ya about the drawbacks of the industry............. so why is Dodge so scared of casinos???? How much worse can it be? It might actually get ya out of the dirty dusty town Dodge has become. What ya got to lose?

[lBugsy]

Don't forget that Dodge City was named one of the top 50 places in the United States to visit by the National Bus Tours Association. There was a story about it in the Globe a month or so ago. The CVB works very hard at getting bus tours to come to Dodge (or to stop for a day and night on their way to somewhere else). A casino would only help.

[Made in the USA]

NBTA stands for National Bus Tours Association?? I thought it was the National Bull$hit Testers Academy------------- WEll, ya learn something everyday!

[Redhead 18]

When this topic was started,in my first paragraph I stated 73 per cent of the voters were against building the Special Event Center in Wright Park Area.

From all the post and information that I have seen, it appears they intend to TRY and build the Motel, Casino, and Event Center or a Convention Center in the same general area again.

My questions are, Why do we have a very small group of people that do what they want even if they know it will not work. We have one group that wants a Event Center, another group wants a Convention Center, still another group wants something that would be like the 3-I show.

It would appear that if you are going to invest several million dollars you would not want to lock yourself in an area with Grain Elevator, Rail Road tracks, small streets, unless some one will make a killing from the property the City will need to purchase.

How do you feel about the Location?

[K C Muffin]

Well, I'm not a voter, but I have an opinion....

When it was decided a new city pool couldn't be located in Wright Park because of location, parking, etc., etc., etc., there was not a lot of support for the other location.

So now why the sudden interest in building a new building in Wright Park. All the old problems are still there with a few additional ones. Is that the best face the city can put forward for it's convention/activity visitors? Or is it a place the city already owns property and is trying to make use of it?

So put the building in Wright Park. It's not going to be convenient to lodging or restaurants there. Or are they going to sell park property to private investors for that? And about the streets around there. Uck! Besides the events center, there's gonna be some huge bills to pay to get DC ready.

[Bubba]

The Wright Park area should not be the location of any of the projects. That was decided by a vast majority of voters.

The SEC, should be just that a Special Events Center, not a convention center, not a 3-i type building. But a special events center, that would seat between 7000-10000 people for special events like concerts, monster truck shows, indoor rodeos, large circus shows (not the small ones the shriners bring to Dodge now), there should be the ability to have ice on the arena floor to bring in Ice Capades type shows.

If they are just going to build a convention center or a 3-i building, they might as well not build it because it will be doomed for failure, casino or not.

[Mike B.]

Strobel also said it's extremely unlikely under normal circumstances that sales tax collections would fail to meet projections. But if they did, the city and county would not be legally obligated to cover the shortfall by raising property taxes because the only collateral for sales tax bonds is sales tax revenue.

He said the city and county could take another approach to dealing with the shortfall, such as extending the repayment period or using bond reserve accounts.

"But the bottom line is, they don't go on property taxes," he said.

This was published in the Globe on March 29th, 2005.


I agree with Ken Stroble. A loss of sales tax from Ford County does not mean a property tax increase to make up the shortfall.

We can repeal the County's sales tax for WND projects without fear of property tax increases.


Maybe it's time to re-evaluate if the SEC even needs a convention center included. The casino vote passed and that facility will have a convention cernter. Do we need two convention centers in Dodge City? We can save tax payers alot of money by rejecting or modifying the County's and City agreement with Global.

[Mike B.]

The repeal vote date has been postponed. The vote to repeal the County's sales tax (1/2%) was set for July 24th. But since Mr. Dalton wanted a Judge, once agian, Mr. Innes, to decide if property tax would increase if the repeal was a success, we'll wait for Mr. Innes to make a decision. He is scheduled to hear oral arguments on July 18th from the City's legal counsel, the County's legal counsel and Mr. Dalton.

I agree with the decision to postpone the vote. It'll give people time to find out that property tax will not have to pick up the bill for the City and County's failure to do what should have been done along time ago! Oh well, that's water under the bridge now.

I guess we'll just have to wait, once again, for someone outside of our community to decide for US what WE can and can not do!