Quote:
Originally Posted by
thrylos98
Ok. Methinks that we are talking about apples and oranges. There is a high lever economic analysis in this thread suggesting that the Fort Myers area is getting a good $25-50 Million at least a year because the Twins are holding Spring Training there. That's the financial impact. Tickets are little of this, taxes are little of this. Hotel rooms, restaurant meals and miscellaneous consumption is the bulk of the money that goes to the pockets of people in Lee County. You lose that and you lose about 25% of the hotels and the restaurants in the area and about 10% of the stores. Wanna go there? Feel free.
Think of it as an infrastructure investment. If the county spends $10 million to add a lane to the highway do they get it back in their coffers? How about sewer and water improvement? Nope.
Lets assume that your $50 million is correct a
nd there is $50 million in incremental spending in Lee County because of Twins. That means that the County gets $3 million in tax revenues. That barely pays off the "investment" in 30 years. But, over that time, the Twins would have asked for another $50 million and the $20 million the county still owes on the old Red Sox facility is not being paid.
In reality, not all of the $50 million is incremental. Believe it or not, tourist come to Ft Myers for other things than Spring Training.
Next, your claim that Ft Myers would lose 25% of the hotels and restaurants and 10% of the stores is laughable. Again, lets assume the $50 million total you claim is ALL INCREMENTAL to Spring Training and would go away if the Twins moved to a different location. That is 0.4% of all taxable sales in the county. Clearly certain facilitites taht receive economic "rents" because of their location to the stadium or are directly related to the tourist trade might be impacted, but that is far from your overstated claims. And, again, that is assuming taht all of the $50 million leaves. It would not.
Lastly, your last comment addresses what the proper role of government should be. Local governments obviously have a role in sewer and water improvements and road construction. I would even argue that they could play some role in helping a project like improving Hammonds stadium (read above) and helping the Twins gain revenue (let them control the naming rights). But, $45 million to make these improvements is way beyond their role. If these improvements are needed, the Twins should make these improvements and charge the increases back to their customers, i.e. the Fans. If they cannot be charged back to the customers, then it clearly calls into question the true NEED for such improvements.