APPLETON, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – The ceremonial groundbreaking Thursday for the Fox Cities Exhibition Center.
The center will be built just south of the Radisson Paper Valley Hotel in downtown Appleton. It will also incorporate Jones Park, which is currently closed for renovations.
The $31 million building will be paid for through hotel room taxes collected by 10 Fox Valley communities.
It’s a day many leaders with the Expo Center project, like Pam Seidl, Executive Director of the Fox Cities Convention & Visitors Bureau, have been waiting for. She spoke to WLUK.
“This has been more than 30 years of effort. It’s a really exciting day. Some of us, we always knew it would happen.”
It took lots of meetings, financing, planning… not to mention the agreement of 10 municipalities to raise room tax rates.
Tim Hanna, Mayor of Appleton, calls the process a positive example of teamwork.
“I think that’s something that the Fox Cities can be very proud of. You have so many people that are passionate about where we live, and they find a way to put their differences aside, and come together, and accomplish really great things.”
Seidl says it may take some time before the Center is flooded with events.
“It’s sort of a ramp up phasing because they’re booking four, five, six years out. In the interim, we’ll be working with the Radisson Paper Valley to book smaller groups who don’t book out as far, so everyone gets to experience the exhibition center.”
The expo center won’t just benefit those who come to rent it out, there will be a public plaza that will interact with nearby Jones park.
Feasibility studies on the expo center have shown it will bring in nearly seven million new dollars annually… and this passionate group of leaders hope that will only increase over the years.
Plans call for the building to open in fall 2017.
