Convention Center failure due to avarice, arrogance and abuse

And then came the day of reckoning.

According to the Lancaster Sunday News: “As of Monday, the Lancaster County Convention Center Authority will begin receiving 100 percent of the revenues generated by the county’s hotel tax.

“And the agency that markets county tourism is out of luck.

“For months, officials have worried that a shortfall in hotel tax revenue might result in the authority falling below the $5.25 million its lenders require it to keep in reserves for two consecutive quarters. The second quarter ended Friday…”

For most of the Convention Center Project objectors, the issue was not to prevent the project.  Rather it was that a Feasibility Study should be commissioned to determine whether it was financially viable and, if so,  in what location and at what size.

For example, a smaller version could have been built as an extension to the Brunswick Hotel, a far less expensive and practical approach.  Moreover,  it would have  simultaneously solved the problems that had  long inflicted the languishing Lancaster Square Project.  But that would not have provided an opportunity for big profits for local interests and the Brunswick owners were ignored.

Project proponents disregarded the concerns and advice of the hotel industry.  They represented that there was a Feasibility Study when there was not.  They claimed to have the vast support of the community for government guarantees of debt when a poll showed the opposite to be true.  They viciously attacked and by doing so destroyed any chance of re-election of the county commissioners for having the audacity to ask the right questions and request  a Feasibility Report be made.  Then they chose to deride and later ignore the findings of the PFK Feasibility Report, ordered and paid for by the Commissioners.

Tens upon tens of millions of dollars went to the Project’s chief sponsor, the High Group, who managed  (mismanaged and misdesigned?) the project and later was the major construction  contractor.

The School District of Lancaster was deprived of greatly needed funds because the hotel and convention center are both exempt from real estate taxes.

The City of Lancaster through RACL has guaranteed the bonds  for the Marriott Hotel.  (Ironically, The Sunday News is seeking information on how the Marriott Hotel is doing.  A Lancaster Newspapers, Inc.’s subsidiary is half owner of the hotel but we understand the ethical considerations involved.)

A former Lancaster district attorney sits as a judge today in part as an award for leading almost a year long witch hunt to discredit the then commissioners including project opponents Dick Shellenberger and Molly Henderson.  (Their plea bargain to a minor violation of the ambiguous Sunshine Act was figuratively at a point of a gun, although the Lancaster Newspapers made it out to be the crime of the century.)  Despite attempt after attempt by D. A. Donald Totaro, jumping from subject to subject to find some culpability on the part of the commissioners, the Grand Jury in its report came up with absolutely nothing apart from the plea bargain.

Convention Center chair Ted Darcus (an otherwise decent man) brutally rammed the Project through the Convention Center Authority, using the votes of his ‘hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil’ four stooge City appointees who at the time made up the majority.

And the citizenry was ‘raped’ by the absurdly one sided, outlandish business terms in the agreements between Penn Square Partners and the Convention Center Authority.  The authority members were never briefed by counsel and were given only a day and a half before the meeting to review voluminous and technical legal documents, despite the fact they had their own  job obligations and were volunteers. Darcus refused to delay a vote to give them time to review the agreements.

(To his credit, Darcus has been doing penance by remaining on the Authority Board… as we said above, a basically decent guy.  The question is what forces and inducements, if any,  were directed at him to cause him to act in such a way? We hypothesize it was to gain financial support for the establishment of the Bright Side Baptist Community Center.)

We all hope that the Convention Center Project over time succeeds.  Perhaps someday Penn Square Partners will do the right thing concerning the School District of Lancaster which has been deprived of a half a million dollars a year in tax revenue.   But no matter what the future holds, the scars will remain.   In part, this is because the very fabric of community cohesion and  decency were torn apart by those whom we had come to trust.

For details, visit NewsLanc’s series on the Convention Center.

https://newslanc.com/category/convention-center-series/