Locals say Ark Encounter not helping local economy

Can we have a "Gonchback" to where the discussion involved the economic impacts, subsidies and tax breaks, etc. from about 4-5 years ago? Pretty sure this was predicted... ;~)

Tourist attractions seem to be the unicorns of tax incentives. Everyone is convinced that giving tax breaks to a tourist attraction is going to yield the next Walt Disney World. Are there any bona fide examples where this worked out, other than for Florida?

Rule number one in asking the government to do anything is overstate the benefits. Rule two is understate the costs. Makes it difficult for many projects to work out economically.

If I remember right, this deal involved sales tax rebates. And the bond issuance wasn't guaranteed by the city/county. So the city/county shouldn't have been negatively impacted by fact that project isn't succeeding as hoped.

But something said in the article that is confusing is they are thinking about adding a 2% payroll tax. If you have a city income tax, rebating the sales taxes from the project can make sense because you will get additional income tax revenue and you wouldn't have had the sale taxes without the project anyway. But if you do not have an income tax, that benefit will not be there.

So what benefits were they expecting? Additional tax revenues from restaurants and hotels? Look to rule number one for that.

It's big and perhaps neat to see once but what's the allure to bring people back? "New for 2020 the ark actually floats"

And why is a Government that separates church and state and nearly broke funding such a project?! Don't even get me started on the BS that Christianity teaches. Especially with Noah's ark :: rolls eyes ::

My only reason to visit would be for the comedic value.

Government didn't "fund" the project, technically, it only offered sales tax incentives.

rollergator said:

Can we have a "Gonchback" to where the discussion involved the economic impacts, subsidies and tax breaks, etc. from about 4-5 years ago?

There were a surprisingly number of Ark Encounter discussions. A lot were pretty shallow. Not sure this is the one you were thinking, but it's one of the most active from the time:

https://coasterbuzz.com/Forums/Topic/opinion-kentucky-tax-breaks-fo...a-bad-idea

Perhaps a "Pilgrimage Clause" could be retroactively inserted into the bible?

I think the problem, as the LG link shows, is we got distracted by the Keystone pipeline. Without that distraction, we figure all the economics of the Ark out and county in Kentucky is flush with cash and looking to build a new community center with the excess.