According to today’s Boston Globe, officials over at the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority are considering plans to expand the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center into a one million square-foot “tourism campus” along the waterfront.
The total price tag could reach a billion dollars, some of which might be paid through increased travel and tourism taxes.
I wonder, is this really a wise investment?
Convention centers basically act as a loss leader. Their purpose is to draw tourist business to the state by creating a destination. By investing in convention infrastructure, the state is essentially making a gamble that every dollar spent will be recouped several times over by the local economy through hotel stays, restaurant visits, plane and taxi service, and other services.
The problem with convention centers is that the initial public investment is huge, and business is uncertain and takes a long time to develop. There’s no guarantee that the state’s gamble will pay off, and there’s no telling how long it will take to break even.
It seems to me that with all the economic problems our state is facing right now, this is not the time to be exploring ambitious plans for expanding the BCEC. As the Boston Herald points out in an editorial today, we haven’t even finished paying for the original construction of the BCEC yet.
There are lots of ways our state could invest a billion dollars if we wanted to, and many of them would have more immediate and helpful effects on the economy. Why take a gamble on convention business when we could make other more direct investments to help put people back to work right now?
What do you think? Is expanding the BCEC worth the risk? Or is it just a costly gamble? Please post a comment below to let me know what you think.
