At a press conference this afternoon, conservative Republican mayoral candidate Matt Kelty flanked by businessman Tom Spiece and other local business owners, called on the Fort Wayne City Council to postpone any vote on the City’s proposed $130M Harrison Square project until a new administration and City Council is voted into office in November.

“We call today for Fort Wayne’s City Council, on Councilmen Dr. John Crawford and Tom Didier in particular, to demonstrate their respect for the voters of Fort Wayne. The public is already shouldering enormous debt,” said Kelty, “And the numbers for the Harrison Square stadium deal continue to change. The men and women with me today understand that sustainable development must be driven by the private sector. Give us time to do what should have been done to begin with.”

“Notwithstanding the majority of Fort Wayne residents oppose the Harrison Square project as proposed by the City, including now my opponent Nelson Peters apparently, there just does not appear to be enough private funding in the deal to make this a good financial prospect for the citizens of Fort Wayne. The larger issue is one of credibility. The city has a dismal track record executing to cost and schedule these types of projects. Plus the fact, I just don’t think it’s fair for the Mayor and some outgoing City Council members to pull the pin on the grenade, then run. Where is accountability for them?”

In past years, similar economic development projects sponsored by the City and County have defaulted or remain highly subsidized. These projects include Micro Standard, the Hilton Hotel, Burlington Northern, and Midtowne Crossing. Between 2000-2004, the Grand Wayne Center enjoyed operating subsidies averaging $3.67M a year of taxpayer dollars and average annual operating losses of $1.42M according to a recent analysis by a respected Fort Wayne CPA familiar with the City and County finances. Another hit to the viability of public development is the Plaza Parking Garage, which has averaged annual losses of more than $232.5K or over $19K a month in recent years.

“I know the Mayor has recently painted a rosy financial picture for the city and he’s got the local newspapers in full marketing mode promoting Harrison Square leading up to the vote this month”, said Kelty. “But the reality is, the city and county have reported to the state at the end of last year, that we have current debt obligations of nearly $810M. Add to that proposed taxpayer liabilities of $500M for FWCS, $100M estimated for the other school systems, $160M liability for Harrison Square, and our other pending and mandated obligations such as $35M for the Grand Wayne Center, $225M for Police and Firefighters unfunded pension liabilities, and an estimated $240M storm water and sewer separation project, and the taxpayers will be saddled with approximately $2.07B of debt in 2007. That is a heavy load to pass on to our children with or without the ballpark. Why add to it? Shouldn’t we work to pay off our balance before we continue to run up the credit card?”

The over $2B in debt projected in 2007 for Fort Wayne and Allen County equates to a cost of nearly $25,000 for each household in Fort Wayne, or a cost of over $6,000 for each of the approximately 340,000 residents of Allen County.

“I agree with the wisdom of former Allen County Commissioner Ed Rousseau”, said Kelty. “The only fair thing to do is to postpone the voting until the new administration is in place. It does not seem right for one administration to make the decision on such a large project and then leave office and not have to face construction and financial problems that will occur”, Kelty said quoting Rousseau. “I call on City Council to postpone the vote on Harrison Square until after the general elections in the fall, when a new administration and City Council can be held responsible and accountable to the people for the decisions and performance of any proposed project. If it is such a good deal, it should keep until then. Other than putting a notch in someone’s belt before they ride out of town, what’s the hurry?”

A random poll of likely Fort Wayne voters was conducted between 27-29 Mar 07 by Zogby International. The margin of error of the poll is +/-5%. 8,713 calls were made to likely Fort Wayne voters and 401 participants responded to the following questions:

Q: Do you support or oppose the Harrison Square downtown development as proposed by the City of Fort Wayne?

Support                Oppose    Not Sure

All 31.6%                54.0%     14.5%

Men 29.8%             56.9%    13.3%

Women 33.2%       51.3% 15.5%

Democrats 49.3%  36.7% 13.9%

Republicans 31.3% 53.1% 15.5%

Independents 18.8% 69.4% 11.7%

Q: Whether or not you support or oppose the project as a whole, which one of the following parts of the City’s proposed Harrison Square project are you most opposed to?

Ballpark Condos Hotel Parking Garage Public Financing Retail Space Not Sure

All 57.3% 4.5% 1.4% 1.5% 18.4% 2.5% 14.4%

Men 53.2% 3.1% 0.7% 0.5% 22.6% 2.3% 17.6%

Women 61.0% 5.8% 2.1% 2.3% 14.6% 2.7% 11.5%

Democrats 58.9% 6.1% 0.0% 1.4% 13.4% 5.2% 15.0%

Republicans 55.2% 5.0% 1.7% 1.3% 20.4% 2.3% 14.1%

Independents 62.9% 1.7% 1.7% 2.0% 15.2% 1.2% 15.3%

“The fate of this project is in the hands of City Council, as Mayor I, like everyone else, will have to live with any decision they make, and I won’t be able to undo it”, said Kelty. “What I can do though, is make sure the people are heard on this issue, and hope the City Council is listening. I call on them to postpone the vote on Harrison Square.”

The results of the Zogby poll also showed Kelty and his primary opponent in the Mayor’s race in a statistical dead heat at 25% to 26% among all polled, but Kelty leading 31% to 25% Republican primary voters.

Posted by AWB

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