At noon Aug. 11 in Penn Square following the Intelligencer Journal article heralding "Center closes fund gap," members of Lancaster First distributed a thousand fliers refuting most of the Convention Center / Hotel sponsors' and Mayor Rick Gray's assertions that new money had been found to bridge the $20 million deficit.
The Intelligencer Journal story stated, "The funds would come from a variety of sources, including $1 million in additional funding from private hotel developer Penn Square Partners and $2 million for naming rights to the convention center."
The article includes an excerpt from a communication from a spokesman for Lancaster First, as follows: "No matter how good the intentions of project supporters, it is time for all parties to recognize that this funding gap cannot be responsibly bridged, and that by joining together as a community we can pursue several worthier alternatives."
But the Intell fails to mention the following substantive observations from Lancaster First:
"1) The $7 million in savings from the parking garage, now to be funded by Lancaster Newspapers, Inc., was never part of the original budget, and therefore can't be counted as reducing the deficit.
"2) The $3 million pledged by the Historic Preservation Trust..." (which executive director Timothy Smedick said was an inadvertent reporting error. The Trust will not be donating money to the convention center project).
"3) The $5.25 million in 'value engineering' -- which has been undertaken several times before -- can only result in a substandard facility which will lack aesthetics and result in much higher operating and maintenance expenses."
