More trouble is bubbling for those who hope to make economic arguments for major public/private capital projects — for sports specifically, but also by proxy for the arts. This article in the Boston Globe suggests that the equation linking major facilities to major economic return is losing believers, if not losing steam:
This new skepticism of public sports team funding is thanks in part to a small community of economists who have taken up and methodically rejected many of the claims made about the economic benefits of major league sports teams: that they create jobs or bring money to local businesses or otherwise spur economic growth. ”Generally speaking,” says Andrew Zimbalist, a professor at Smith College and a leading sports economist, ”the independent research suggests that we can’t anticipate any economic impact” from sports teams and stadiums.
Thankfully for the sports franchises, many cities are immune to the consistent perspectives of economists on the issue. (According to economist Allen Sanderson, ”Cities would be better off…if the mayor were to go up in a helicopter and dump out $100,000.”) Whether it’s for sense of pride, sense of place, love of the sport, or the bidding frenzy associated with a strategically scarce resource (professional sports franchises), they continue to invest significant amounts of taxpayer cash.
While the Globe article focuses exclusively on sports facilities, you could easily replace the phrase ”major league sports facilities” with ”world-class cultural facilities” to see where the debate is going. Even though most city officials have yet to catch on, we’d best be polishing up a different set of arguments (and start thinking differently ourselves) for the battles yet ahead.
Maybe these beleaguered sports boosters can take a cue from the arts and claim that their new stadiums will flood the community with tourism dollars. Calling Frank Gehry…
Do you know of any studies on recreation centers?
http://elginite.blogspot.com/2006/03/time-to-centrecise.html
No, I don’t know of any studies on recreation centers. There’s been a fair amount of work on convention centers, here’s one:
http://www.hotel-online.com/Trends/ERA/ERAImpactConventionCenters.html
which ends with this interesting and useful conclusion (substitute ”civic center” with ”recreation center” if you like):
”The point, however, is to be honest in the community’s objectives. It is a mistake to try to justify development of a civic center for your own residents’ use by claiming it will have great economic impacts. Civic centers are public precisely because they serve social purposes, yet are not sufficiently profitable to be provided by the private sector.
If you are in this situation, you should stop feeling guilty about wanting facilities to expand your own quality of life. Community-serving facilities may not generate great economic benefits, but they are good for you anyway.”
An important distinction with respect to these studies is that between direct economic impact and indirect impact. Obviously the direct impact is the dollars spent by people coming to a performance, event, etc. However, when assessing the desireability of a community, companies looking to relocate and individuals making decisions consider many factors, including sports and culture. The exsistence of an orchestra, a museum or a sports franchise are important factors even if they are never or rarely used. There is a sense that their availability is desireable and that they give both stature and glamour to the community, causing a significant indirect impact in terms of people and businesses coming to a community to live and even visit (without even spending time at the relevant site, other than a walk or drive by). Many people want to live in a community where the arts are valued and available even though they will never take advantage of them, because it appeals to an image and a life-style that they find desireable or that they aspire to, or because it attracts like minded people with whom they wish to associate. Measurements that do not take this into account are not telling the entire story.