Peoria Pundit

Via Merle Widmer:

Museum problems have been mounting in recent years. Nichael Conforti, writes in today’s WSJ, “Hardly a day goes by without announcements by museums from Los Angeles to Detroit to New York of substantial reductions in programs, exhibitions, capital projects and staffing–collateral damage from a global financial drubbing that walloped museum donors, retail sales, and most critically, endowments.

Even the enormously wealthy J. Paul Getty Museum last month announced a job freeze and other cot cutting measures.” Poorly endowed are in dire situations in on the verge of going bust. Some have taken to selling donated offering which is a “no-no” in the museum business.

To call building a museum a stimulus to the community is more than likely to be a substantial financial drag on this community forever. Short term gains will look puny 5 years from now.

From my inbox:

The Block: “Peoria’s Own Economic Stimulus Package”

Peoria—The Block is Peoria’s own economic stimulus package—so let’s get to work! That is the message that local economists and union leaders will share at a press event at Peoria’s Labor Temple tomorrow morning.

Engine of Economic Growth

Independent researchers Robert Scott, Ph.D., and Joshua Lewer, Ph.D., will release information on their economic impact study of the Peoria Riverfront Museum and Caterpillar Experience on Peoria’s riverfront.

The researchers used national, state and local data sources and time-tested multipliers in their analysis. Their findings indicate The Block would create approximately:

• 1,100 jobs during the two-year construction phase
• 90 jobs per year after construction
• $210 million in business development and county growth during construction

Let’s Get to Work

The West-Central Illinois Building and Construction Trades Council (WCIBCTC) represents 20 individual construction craft unions and nearly 15,000 members living in Central Illinois. Executive Director Dan Silverthorn and Council President Mike Everett say the Block project would employ 250 to 300 workers per month and generate $1.8 million in labor payroll monthly over a 25-month construction period. And through an unprecedented agreement among Caterpillar, the Museum Collaboration Group and the Greater Peoria Area Contractors and Suppliers Association, the entire Block would be built with 100 percent local union labor.

• Wednesday, February 4, 2009
• 10:00 a.m.
• Peoria Labor Temple
• 400 NE Jefferson Ave

Speakers Include:

• Dr. Bob Scott, Professor of Economics, Bradley University
• Dr. Joshua Lewer, Assistant Professor of Economics, Bradley University
• Dan Silverthorn, Executive Director, West-Central Illinois Building and Construction Trades Council
• Mike Everett, President, West-Central Illinois Building and Construction Trades Council

Via Merle Widmer, who has actually paid a visit to the Dubuque Museum and finds the lack of transparency troubling:

Everybody who works at this museum is thrilled. They have a nice job with benefits. But financially, the nice museum which I have visited is a financial bust even though originally financed by a grant from the the State of Iowa for $50 million. The Chamber of Commerce supports the museum as do all chambers everywhere, support projects using taxpayer dollars. Since it received the large lump sum grant, it has received other taxpayer funded grants and at least $1 million dollars from the gambling boat next door. Despite drawing 301,000 visitors the first year it still failed to meet its operating budget by $500,000. The second year, the museum drew 250,000 and the third year, 220,000. Since then, the museum will not release numbers to outsiders.

The Build the Block crowd cites this museum when it makes hard-to-believe claims about local attendance. How can they, when the Dubuque Museum stopped telling people how many people are visiting the place? That would be a red flag to anyone wanting to gather honest and accurate statistics, rather than just create propaganda. It’s like they aren’t even trying to make up good lies.

Merle also looks at Lakeview Museum’s, surprise, lack of transparancy about financial problems.

Merle Widmer, who recently tipped us off to the failure of the Cedar Rapics IMAX, says he thinks Caterpillar stockholders who are nervous about how the economy is affecting their stock price, may put pressure on Caterpillar bosses to stop wasting money on this museum/visitor center thing.

By the way: Has ANYONE in the Peoria media mentioned the Cedar Rapids thing? I mean, the Build the Block ads make a huge frigging deal about IMAX, but it’s apparently not the sure-fire money maker that some people claim it is. You would think that the mainstream media would report on that sort of thing .. well, at least when they aren’t running down stories about lost dogs.

For a guy who swore off blogging with any regularity, C.J. Summers is churning out posts that shock full of common sense.

Consider this post, where he looks at the numbers supplied by the Built the Block crowd smells something fishy going on. Why isn’t Peoria’s only daily newspaper of record going over these numbers and pointing out how wildly unrealistic they are? Too busy doing lost dog stories, I suppose.

Not that it matters really. The powers-that-be are doing their damnedest to scare voters into passing a tax increase onto voters to pay to built it. And because it cannot possibly be self supporting, they WILL make this temporary tax permanent in order to keep it open. They have to, because people from all over the state will NOT travel to Peoria see it, and the vast majority of Peorians will not visit it more than once, if that.