[NEohioPAL]CTC on advocacy

[Richard B Ingraham]

On Sun, 27 Jul 2003 22:22:35 -0400 Rebecca Borger
<rborger at flamingmailbox.com> writes:
> follow through.  What a lot of members of our community don't know 
> is 
> that there were other convention center proposals out there.  There 
> 
> were several developed by independent contractors that would not 
> have 
> cost the city a dime, but our leaders have chosen the most expensive 
> 
> one to be on the ballot.  

 <snip>

> Think twice before voting for the new convention center and look at 
> all 
> of the facts


I think Rebecca has some very valid points here.  Although I'll admit,
that I have not really paid much attention to the actual proposals,
mostly due to the fact that I rarely have any "real" vote in such
projects, since I live in Lake and not Cuyahoga county.  But I seem to
remember at least one of the proposals was to simply remodel the old
downtown convention center.

I simply can not understand why we need to build yet another convention
center, when it wasn't that long ago that they spent a bunch of money on
the downtown convention center as a remodeling project. Why not just
remodel or expend the one we already have?  Maybe someone will actually
make use of Public Hall and/or Public Auditorium then as well.  By
building yet another new convention center, we will then be stuck with
two empty (or almost empty), worthless convention centers.  (The one
downtown, by the mall, and the huge IX Center, by the airport.)  Maybe
it's just because I'm not as informed as I should be, but I've yet to
hear anything mentioned in the big Convention Center plans, about what
becomes of these two old venues, and any useful plans for them.

I'm all for arts advocacy as anybody else on the list.  Believe me, my
livelihood depends on it.  But not at the cost of the big picture.

If it's true that arts funding will only come as "package" deal, then I'm
afraid it's a sad day for us artists.


Richard B. Ingraham
Free-lance Sound Design/Engineer/Technician
RBI Computers & Audio
email at: RBIngraham at juno.com
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