"Ham?! Did you say 'low-fat ham'?!" (Jack Bog's Blog)

Remember Susan Powter, the "Stop the Insanity!" weight-loss gal from the early '90s? "A fat-free cookie is not food!" she'd scream on the infomercials in that husky voice of hers. She needs to revive her business up here in the Pacific Northwest. She could yell, "A convention center hotel paid for by the taxpayers is not economic development!"

An alert reader points out that, as Portland rushes like a lemming to build just such a heavily tax-subsidized hotel, one of our neighbors to the north has also drunk the Konvention Kool-Aid and ginned up a $79 million convention center expansion to compete with Portland. All the more reason to quit while we're behind.

Oh, and the contractor on the Spokane deal? Why, none other than Portland's Hoffman Construction, which built our own misguided convention center expansion -- this time around, in partnership with a Spokane outfit. That's gratitude for you, eh? I suppose that next they'll come back down and build the Hotel Elefante Blanco for us, too.

Comments (4)

yea, just look at the Hult Center here in Eugene if you want an example.

it started out not even breaking even until they finally realized that having the non-politically correct music groups like the Grateful Dead actually brought in money.

At least one thing I will get them kudos for, is that they built a parking garage next door to the facility unlike University of Oregon which is building two brand-new buildings and in 2008 will be hosting the Olympic track and field trials in an area where there's already no parking, no staff in law enforcement to handle the additional traffic, congestion on the streets, in addition to our major Thruway's being choked off by a $29 million 14 mile bus system.

the economy here in Oregon sucks, and until they start using some common sense to bring businesses back into Oregon is not going to get any better and taxing people to death for the stupid projects does not help our economy.

Posted by Robin | November 1, 2005 6:24 AM

What I never understood...if this is such a win-win idea, why wouldn't a privately-owned corporation build a hotel on their own?

Now I'll answer my own question: It doesn't get built because they know it would lose money and the only people who build projects that can stand to lose money (and keep their jobs) are usually working for the government...in Portland...

Posted by Mike D | November 1, 2005 7:21 PM

I'm not in agreement regarding some of Jack Bog's pet peeves in the Portland development scene, but further propping up of the convention center is ludicrous. I say sell the thing the highest bidder and get it off the taxpayer's hands. I went there a couple of weeks ago for "Girlfest," a girl scout promo - I can't imagine that they made much money off of the girl scouts. And there were no high-powered high-paying convention tenants to be seen.

Posted by Martha | November 2, 2005 9:58 AM

She *is* a Northwesterner. She lives in Seattle.

Posted by pdxkona | November 5, 2005 12:05 PM

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Tuesday, November 1, 2005

"Ham?! Did you say 'low-fat ham'?!"

Comments (4)

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