Posted on Thu, Nov. 19, 2009

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Coliseum delay should be short

The Sedgwick County Commission was right last summer to want to chart a productive future for the Kansas Coliseum complex. But especially with county staff warning that even the better of two proposals would put taxpayers at significant financial risk, the commission also was right Wednesday in declining to pick a developer and start contract negotiations.

The big decision merits more study and debate, which means more time. But doing nothing right now can't lead to doing nothing.

The commission recently had to pull $585,000 from the downtown arena sales-tax fund to subsidize the Coliseum pavilions, which posted a net cash loss of about $730,000 last year. That's not sustainable.

If anything was clear from the lengthy, contentious discussion at the commission bench before Wednesday's 3-2 vote, it was that the commissioners are not clear on what they want to do with the Coliseum complex and its property.

(That confusion, as well as the economy, may help explain why the county sent requests for proposals to 43 developers but ended up with only two problematic proposals to choose from.)

A committee had recommended that the commission negotiate with North American Management-Kansas, whose $25 million plan included the addition of three hotels and mixed-use retail on site as well as its operation of the existing pavilions.

Before deciding against the recommendation, the commissioners all made worthy points. Among them:

* That the committee's favored proposal risked conflict with the county's contract with SMG to manage the Intrust Bank Arena, as Commissioner Dave Unruh noted.

* That if the Coliseum land doesn't serve a governmental purpose it's arguably best returned to the tax rolls, as Commissioner Karl Peterjohn said, perhaps as a shovel-ready industrial site.

* That privatizing the Coliseum pavilions could lead to much higher fees for their faithful user groups, and that the county has yet to resolve issues about the property's boundaries and state-protected spotted-skunk habitat, as Commissioner Tim Norton observed. Nor has the county found out "what the market value would be if it's offered along an interstate as a retail development property or an industrial property," Norton said.

Though the vote found them in the minority, Commissioner Gwen Welshimer and Chairman Kelly Parks also expressed valid concerns about the need to keep moving on a Coliseum plan and what a delay would mean for dog, horse and rodeo events booked at the complex.

All in all, the majority commissioners' caution was welcome Wednesday. The risk now becomes that the delay will translate into more cost to the county and decay for the Coliseum. County leaders must see that it doesn't.

— For the editorial board, Rhonda Holman

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