Special Series: "When Pigs Fly" This is a collection of articles on the facts, problems and issues other communities are having with their current or planned Conference/Convention Centers. Task force working to sell residents on civic center Three civic centers give Marion backers examples of what works Panel recommends market analysis BY HARRIET DANIELS STAFF WRITER OCALA -- One thing seems unanimous among a group of people called together by the Star-Banner to discuss a proposed civic center, and it is that the community needs such a facility. However, the group had a myriad of questions about the issue. The general consensus of the group was that a study be conducted to determine what the community needs and wants in a civic center. "There is a great local demand,'' said Pete Tesch, president of the Ocala/Marion County Economic Development Council. "A civic center has the ability to induce other demands on a regional, state, and even U.S. (national) basis. There are groups and conferences that would come if we have that center.'' Tesch said a market analysis should be done before rallying political support and financing efforts. Mary Britt, executive director of the Ocala Civic Theater, said the local task force must also decide what facilities they want the civic center to offer. She said the estimated $9 million construction budget seems low. "They don't want to end up with a rectangle and not be able to bring anything in,'' Britt said. The panel also questioned where the civic center would be located. Several panel members voiced concern that the location be able to handle the traffic the facility is likely to attract and cause the least amount of stress on existing roads. "I just keep worrying about traffic,'' said Janet Shelley, student activities director at Vanguard High School. Funding construction and operation of the center was also foremost in the minds of the panel. Many wondered whether voters will finally accept a special tax, given the electorate's history of defeating tourist development taxes and sales taxes. "I've seen the sales tax and others fail. I don't know how you break through the mindset to get them passed,'' Shelley said. Tesch said a marketing plan should be developed to inform the public about the proposed civic center separately from the issue of a tax. "This (the civic center) is a massive undertaking,'' he said. "It's realizable, but you need to do your homework.'' Ann Spang, vice president of membership for the Ocala/Marion County Economic Development Council, agrees that a feasibility study should be done. But she is also concerned that the admission for many events will be too high to make any profit. "It is $70,000 to bring in Colin Powell and if we put him in an arena with 5,000 seats, it would be only about $14, but we could not bring him here because there is nowhere large enough,'' Spang said. Narvella Haynes, president of the Governor's West Ocala Neighborhood Revitalization Committee, wonders how many organizations would commit to use the facility regularly to generate revenue. Britt believes at some point elected officials are going to have to pass the taxes they can and not be afraid of getting voted out of office. "But I would like to see exactly what the tax is going to be used for,'' Britt said. "For it to be successful, there must be a community buy-in with our everyday citizens and not just the community leaders,'' she said. Rob Davis, a junior at Vanguard High School and a member of the Star-Banner's Team 2000, thinks the proposed civic center is a great idea. He said the facility would appeal to teachers, businesses, the arts and everyone in general. "The potential is there. But I don't think we should rush into this either. We need to have an objective group come in, much like the school audit did for the Marion County School System and analyze the need as well as costs,'' Davis said. "But after this analyzing, we can move on, justified in our actions, and start the ball rolling'' A tool to enhance community involvement is what Emily Gillespie, a junior at Forest High School and a member of Team 2000, identifies as a benefit of the civic center. "I think that a civic center would be a very beneficial addition to the city of Ocala. I think the keys to a successful civic center would be an assessment of local demand and a feasibility study would be a tool to develop the cultural side of our community,'' she said.

Finding the money

Can task force members convince the community to pay for a civic center?

BY SUSAN LATHAM CARR - 03-01-1999

The Civic Center Task Force believes Ocala/Marion County is ready for the $22 million business, arts and sports complex it is proposing. Now they have to find out if people will pay for it.

The 10-member citizen task force, which first met in July under the leadership of City Councilman Mike Amsden, has drafted a plan to pay for the three-structure facility through a combination of private and public dollars.

The plan calls for 50 percent to come from private donations, 25 percent from the sale of unused city- and county-owned land and 25 percent from a tourist development tax.

The first step requires the task force to raise $11 million from private contributions. That is the pledge the task force made to city and county leaders when they asked for $30,000 to pay for promotional materials to sell the idea to potential benefactors.

Finding the deep pockets will be tough, task force members agree, but they believe it can be done.

What happens if they cannot raise private dollars? "Then the party's over," Amsden said.

Task force member Augie Greiner is taking the lead in trying to raise the private funds. He would like to see Broadway plays in Ocala rather than having to drive to other communities.

"There are some very wealthy people here who would like to leave a legacy for what Marion County did for them," Greiner said, adding that he knows many of those people. "They want to give back to this county because the county has been so good to them, and they realize this.

"I would just like to see this community have something up to this level. We are just trying to get this off the ground. It's got to be marketed. We have to see if the community wants this thing."

Task force members concede a lot of work lies ahead.

"The money from the private sector - that's the biggest challenge," task force member Ruben Lamb said. "When that becomes a reality, I think everything else will start to fall in place."

As arduous a task as raising the first $11 million is going to be, the group faces additional challenges in wresting the remaining $11 million from the public. So far, the Ocala City Council and Marion County Commission have pledged support, provided the private dollars are raised. Together they have appropriated $30,000 to help the task force develop fund-raising promotional materials.

The task force hopes to raise the public dollars in two ways.

First, they want to collect $5.5 million from the sale of unused city and county real estate. A selloff would not only make the money available for the civic center, but it would put the property back on the tax rolls, task force members reason. That plan may hit some rough spots.

For one thing, County Commissioner Randy Harris, who is a task force member, said he is not sure how many pieces of land the county has available. One large piece is the fairgrounds and Harris said he would fight selling that acreage.

"I really think that needs to be retained," Harris said. "The day will come when that will be one large parcel in very close proximity to a heavily populated area." He said the county might wish to use that property for a park.

There is some opposition at the city, too.

City Councilman Mike Finn is against building the civic center at this time because, he said, the city has more pressing needs. He wants to provide paved roads and sewer and water to areas of the city lacking those services.

Unlike many of his counterparts, Finn, who successfully fought for a one-mill property tax increase for road resurfacing and police and fire, said he is in favor of tax and fee increases when they offer improvements people in the city can see. But he said he would renounce any suggestion to use money the city may gain from the sale of a nursing home it currently owns - possibly as much as "couple of million" - to develop a civic center. He wants that money used for sewers in unserved areas.

The third leg of the funding plan - passing a tourist development tax, or bed tax - is one that voters have kicked out from underneath other aspiring projects.

"I still think it's a tough nut to crack," task force member Michael Hamer said. But, like others, he believes it is a good way to raise money for the project because it is the traveling public, not the local homeowner or business, that pays the way.

"It's a tax, I think, that is well-deserved by the community for people using our community," Hamer said.

The tourist tax is tacked on to hotel bills. The tax, however, has been on the ballot four times in Marion County and has gone down in resounding defeat each time.

Task force member Phillip Van Hooser believes many of the previous attempts failed because that is the funding route organizers chose first. What makes this effort different is the task force proposes raising half the $22 million from private donors and another 25 percent from the sale of excess public property, he said. When the community has 75 percent of the cash in-hand, he believes they will approve raising the final 25 percent through the tax.

"We need to show the community we are willing to put our money where our mouth is," Van Hooser said.

Other task force members said they believe previous efforts to pass the bed tax failed because the projects were too narrow in focus or they were not explained adequately. Local voters may not have understood it would be visitors, not local citizens, who would pay the tax.

Whatever was on voters' minds, they rejected the tax in November 1978, June 1988, November 1990 and again in September 1994.

The first attempt was for a 2 percent tax to build tourist information centers and for advertising to promote the area. The second effort also was for tourist promotion. The 1990 proposal was to fund a spring training baseball stadium. The last attempt, in 1994, was for promoting Marion County's attractions and varied projects, such as creating a horse park and upgrading existing facilities like the city auditorium.

"It's hard to get any T-A-X passed," said County Commission Chairman Parnell Townley, who is not a task force member. He pointed to the downfall in 1997 of the half-cent sales tax for schools and the 1998 half-cent sales tax for roads. In 1990, a sales tax increase to fund library services also failed.

As of 1997, the latest figures available from Visit Florida, 42 of Florida's 67 counties had bed taxes. In 1997, the various taxes raised $266.7 million statewide. Visit Florida, formerly the state Department of Commerce, is an organization headed by the Commission on Tourism, made up of private industry leaders and legislators.

Counties may levy a tax of 1 to 5 percent of the total charge for lease or rental of hotel or living space for a term of six months or less. In 1997, Alachua County raised $1 million from its 3 percent bed tax.

"I paid them when I was on vacation," said Harris about a recent trip with his family to Chattanooga. "If a tourist tax was placed on the ballot again, and failed, and it was represented that those funds would be dedicated solely to the operations and capital expenditures associated with the convention center, I would say, fine, we have heard from the public and they have no interest."

While he said he believes the bed tax is an appropriate way to raise money, Harris is adamantly against using property taxes to pay for a civic center.

A 2 percent bed tax would raise an estimated $638,000 in one year in Marion County, according to Dave Bruns, state Department of Revenue spokesman. If the estimates are correct, it would take about eight years to raise $5.5 million.

"Obviously, this is a long-term project," Amsden said. "This is part of the plan. First you have to get the tourist tax. Then you have to start collecting it." All the commitments would have to be in place before final plans are put together. He said the center might have to be built in phases with the convention/exhibition center going first, followed by the theater and, finally, the arena.

The idea of a civic center is not a new one. Attorney and former County Judge Janet Behnke was head of the Ocala/Marion County Chamber of Commerce in 1981 when the idea was considered. The idea faded at that time for lack of political will.

"It's hard to believe it's almost 20 years," Behnke said. "My gut reaction is the market is definitely there. I think it has always been there." She advises the current task force to keep trying.

"It's the 'T' most of the time," Behnke said about the public's rejection of taxes to pay for projects. "It's probably the biggest obstacle they will have to overcome now."

Jerry Brown was head of the Chamber in 1986 when a request for a convention center feasibility study was turned down by the Marion County Commission.

"We never got so far as to pick a site or anything like that," Brown said. "It just kind of died on the vine." Back then, a bed tax would have generated an estimated $300,000 to $500,000 annually, he said.

Brown is encouraged by what the current task force has accomplished so far.

"We have City Council and County Commission kind of agreeing to this now, where we didn't have that support before," Brown said.

Task force members are still not certain they will have to ask the public for money. If one or more benefactors come forward and offer more than $11 million, the tax may not be necessary, said Ocala Mayor E.L. Foster, who also is a task force member.

"That's their last choice," Foster said about the bed tax. Foster, who owns the Holiday Inn East and would have to charge his customers the tax, has been involved in a number of the failed attempts to collect a bed tax. He said a 2 percent tax on a $50 room rate would cost a visitor an additional $1.

"Is someone going to leave us and go somewhere else because of a dollar?" Foster asked rhetorically. "I am in the hotel business. No one asks what your tax is on the rate. They ask the room rate. They know they are going to pay tax."

Of course, Foster hopes the community will get behind the project.

"If they turn it down or no one comes along and we can't raise the dollars, everybody on this committee has made an honest effort to make this a better place to live."

© Copyright 1999 Star-Banner

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