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The pretty slides and maps and renderings showing the arena-stadium-fieldhouse complex on greatly-improved lands near downtown —- which currently host a dilapidated bus depot and car dealerships -— were surely meant to soften us up for the coming hit that would rival a tackle from Juwan Simpson or a punch from Deryk Engelland.

Twenty-three per cent. That is the contribution that the Flames, Stamps et. al. envision themselves ponying up for this project. More specifically, $200 million out of an estimated (surely low-balled) total of $890 million. The remainder would come from the City ($200 million), a ticket tax ($250 million) and a community revitalization levy ($240 million).

(And since their proposal doesn’t include cleaning up the creosote-contaminated lands, we can assume that’s another $200 million-ish of public money they’d like.)

Let’s talk about that last one. The idea of a CRL is that all these new buildings and businesses that sprout up around this new development will pay additional tax, so let’s just put that revenue towards the development (often in the form of debt repayments).

Twenty-three per cent. That is the contribution that the Flames, Stamps et. al. envision themselves ponying up for this project.

Calgary used this mechanism in developing the East Village. It’s controversial. Regardless of how you package it, in the end it’s a form of public money that could go elsewhere. The argument is, “Well, that tax revenue wouldn’t be there if we didn’t build this project.”

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Except that studies have shown that these types of projects often only revitalize urban areas in the sense that they draw planned investment away from other parts of the city. And in this case the people profiting from the public money aren’t even funding a quarter of of the project.