A Two Rivers Room Tax Commission member believes the city can use $2 million in revenue bonds to rebuild the Neshotah Beach Concessions Stand.
Rick Carey, who helped finance the Cobblestone Hotel, gave his presentation to the city council during Monday’s (November 24th) work session.
After explaining how a successful TID (Tax Incremental District) was created for the hotel, he presented a hypothetical scenario in which municipal bonds, or city money, could help finance a new beach concession stand with rental space and minimal impact on taxpayers.
Carey specifically mentioned revenue bonds, which are repaid from either room tax or user fees.
His approach would be to use $750,000 in revenue bonds tied to Room Tax dollars, with about $1 million from grant money.
Taxpayers would have to chip in about $100,000, and private donations would cover about $150,000.
Carey’s proposal would mean a new concessions stand built on the beach, which he says would be better than reinvesting in an old building.
“Quite frankly, a 60-plus-year-old building is going to need maintenance continuously,” he admitted. “It’s like buying a 100-year-old home or building a new home. Typically, you have a good 10 years before you got to worry about the roof or the HVAC or the plumbing.”
Carey says the bonds would also maximize the impact of grants and city contributions.
He says getting the project grants is okay.
“We’re competing against other community, Kimberly, we’re competing against Brillion,” he explained. “They’re (the cities) going out and getting them (grants) and that’s the card game. Those are the rules of the game that we play. And if someone is going to get that grant, why shouldn’t it be Two Rivers. Let’s not play Poker and make Aces low for ourselves and high for everybody else.”
Carey finished by saying that his proposal would have a positive community impact, be fiscally responsible, and have long-term value in attracting families to the Cool City.
This hypothetical project is not what the Two Rivers City Council is approving.
City Manager Kyle Kordell has set aside about $255,000 for improvements to the concession stand after public feedback showed residents didn’t want the stand completely redone, but only brought up to health code standards.
The city originally planned to invest about $450,000.
