THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 23, 1994 TAG: 9410210314
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 07 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Bill Reed
LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines
That loud creaking you hear is the proposed amphitheater project getting ready to crash and burn.
Yep. One of the crown jewels in the long-sought, much ballyhooed, much needed Tourism Growth Investment Fund initiative is teetering on the brink of extinction.
What's the Tourism Growth Investment Fund? you ask.
Why, that's the $93-million package of proposed construction designed to bring in thousands of tourists for longer durations and thereby fatten Virginia Beach tax coffers by millions - if not billions.
Included were plans for a $40 million expansion to the Virginia Marine Science Museum, a $40 million expansion to the Pavilion Convention Center; the construction of a major amphitheater; the development of at least six pro-quality golf courses and much, much more in resort street improvements.
Beach residents can rest a little easier now, knowing that at least one project - the marine science museum expansion - actually got under way a month ago.
It seems six members of the same City Council that two years ago approved TGIF, now are getting cold feet.
They are swooning from excruciating pains induced by visions of private-public investment in business ventures that could bring big revenue returns to the city.
This persistent swooning apparently has cost the city a prime chunk of land - a 112-acre Princess Anne Commons tract adjacent to the Municipal Center - on which backers hoped to locate a 20,000-seat amphitheater.
Why? Because the honorables were reluctant to up the ante by $300,000 to equal a $1.5 million bid for the land made by a private competitor to the federal Resolution Trust Corp., an agency that handles foreclosed properties.
To add to the angst over chump change, comes the disheartening word that the city of Chesapeake is making strong, behind-the-scenes overtures to snare the amphitheater. Chesapeake has just as much open land as Virginia Beach and has the same need for a major, money-making attraction.
To complicate matters a little more, consider the advice last year of Price Waterhouse, a prominent, nationally known economic consultant: THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE AMPHITHEATER IN HAMPTON ROADS!
The reason, says Price Waterhouse: The figures just don't add up. Competition for national entertainment acts and for audience dollars just wouldn't support two major amphitheaters in this area.
News of the suddenly shaky future of the Virginia Beach amphitheater project filtered down from City Hall last week about the same time Virginia Beach learned that it lost the only horse racing track to be built in the state in this century to rural New Kent County.
And this news came a year after the developers of Dixie Stampede, a dinner theater operation featuring entertainment with a Civil War theme, pulled out of the city, leaving officials here scratching their heads over the prospect of big bucks disappearing over the horizon to parts unknown.
As Dixie Stampede thundered out of town in search of more welcome spots, local bureaucratic foot-dragging prompted a respected and successful golf course developer and operator to throw up his hands in frustration and watch the Virginia Beach skyline disappear in his rearview mirror.
Now, the big question arises: Why is a city that recently trumpeted its hard-charging economic development offensives constantly shooting itself in the foot?
Why can't the city land the big fish - the Harbor Parks, the Nauticuses, the MacArthur Malls, the Marriott hotel-convention centers that its sister city, Norfolk, does?
Here's a clue: take a real close gander at the folks who now occupy seats on the Virginia Beach City Council. by CNB