Urgency stressed by city officials as tax board approves $30M for convention center project

A Springfield City Council-appointed tax board voted yesterday to recommend the use of $30 million in matching funding for a new convention and event center as officials with the city expressed the urgency with which money must be spent for the project.

The eight-member Citizens’ Advisory Board was unanimous in recommending that council invest $30 million in tax money for the development. The board is tasked with determining how a half-cent portion of a three-quarter-cent sales tax approved by voters last November will be spent; the half-cent portion has been generally geared toward city projects aligned with the Forward SGF comprehensive plan. 

Tim Rosenbury, the city's director of quality of place initiatives, told members of the board that the entire $60 million – $30 million in restricted funding in Gov. Mike Kehoe's budget and the local match – must be spent by a June 2026 deadline.

"By June 10, we have to spend $60 million if we expect to get 100% of the $30 million. Any amount we spend less than $60 million, for every dollar that we don't spend, we lose the opportunity to get 50 cents. We're leaving 50 cents on the table from the state," Rosenbury said. "This is the urgency that we didn't invite, but it's the urgency that we're faced with."

Board member Christina Angle, president and chief financial officer of the Erlen Group, asked whether quality would be impacted by the urgency.

"Are we sacrificing anything for the speed?" she asked.

Deputy City Manager Collin Quigley said the $60 million spend comprises many elements.

"Not all of it is necessarily just construction," he said. "There's a lot with the project that is necessary that is not just construction."

Board member Clif Smart relayed his experience in working with the state on project funding when he was president of Missouri State University.

"There are ways that you can get money out the door so that you can draw it down," he said.

The $60 million comprising the state funding and local match do not represent the full scope of the project. The convention and event center is estimated to cost $175 million, according to past reporting, and additionally, a $209 million hotel complex could be built near it. 

Council voted July 28 to put a 3% lodging tax increase question on the Nov. 4 ballot to help fund the convention center. For more than two decades, the city’s lodging tax has been set at 5%, after voters authorized increases to the original 1979 tax, in 1998 and 2004. 

At the meeting yesterday, city officials responded to board member questions on what would happen if Kehoe does not release the $30 million in restricted funding for the project and if voters do not approve the lodging tax increase ballot measure.

"It changes things. It's a complete reevaluation," Quigley said. "We need all those pieces. You've got to have it all."

Rosenbury added that the city likely would not spend any money on the convention center project until the results of the ballot issue are known.

"Our window for spending that $60 million is fairly narrow, but that's because we have these contingent steps that we're building up," he said. "We don't foresee spending money on anything until and if the citizens approve the hotel tax."

The board also voted yesterday to provide future recommendations for up to $10 million for parks projects, up to $5 million for neighborhood projects and to put $15 million in reserve. The board is next scheduled to meet on Aug. 27.