It’s “simply, absolutely absurd” to accept a consultant’s projections of new business that would result from expanding Raleigh’s city-owned convention center. That’s the assessment of a university professor who has studied convention centers across the country.
Heywood Sanders, professor of public administration at the University of Texas at San Antonio, authored the recent book Convention Center Follies: Politics, Power, and Public Investment in American Cities. He discussed themes from the book during a presentation Monday to the John Locke Foundation’s Shaftesbury Society.
Sanders focused specifically on convention centers in Charlotte and Raleigh. In the video clip below, he assesses projections that an expansion of Raleigh’s convention center would generate an 18 percent increase in business.
Click here to watch the full 1:02:43 presentation.