APPLETON, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – The $31 million Fox Cities Exhibition Center is on pace to be complete in December.
Until now, Appleton has been putting money in to keep it going.
But now a plan is moving forward to secure loans and use hotel room tax dollars from ten Fox Cities communities to pay the loans off.
All ten communities need to sign off on that idea. Those communities all agreed on raising their room tax rates to do so back in 2015.
Appleton Mayor Tim Hanna tells FOX 11….
“If a number of us can agree in principle, then the rest of them are gonna feel pretty good.”
The deal took some extra negotiating to get to this point.
That’s because room tax dollars are already going toward the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center. That debt is about to paid in full — with about $1.4 million left over.
Appleton planned to use $750,000 of that, to put toward the exhibition center loans.
Neenah Mayor Dean Kaufert and other municipality leaders thought the room tax commission should decide where that money goes.
Kaufert says they came to an agreement Thursday.
“We’ve agreed that the room tax commission is gonna make that decision, both on the $750,000 and the additional funds.”
“I think the agreement is that the room tax commission is the right place for it, because they do have representatives from all ten communities.” added Hanna.
He also says the financing plan is very complicated and changed several times.
“I probably should’ve done a better job of, once we got it nailed down, going back and circling back and talking with them.”
In the end, the two mayors say they’re happy with the plan.
“I think there’s a level of trust, there’s a level of respect amongst our communities. At the end of the day we all want what’s best for the region.” said Kaufert.
There is no set deadline for the ten communities to approve the financing agreement.
The room tax commission meets Monday afternoon at 3:00 at the Grand Chute town hall.
