I just read over at Billy Dennis’s blog that the city spends $169,900 per year to operate and maintain the Gateway Building downtown.
I say sell it. Sell it to a private investor. If the city is looking for money to save, this is as good of a place as any to start. A few hundred thousand here and a few hundred thousand there, and pretty soon you’re talking real money. This is nothing more than a banquet hall. Since when is it the city’s responsibility to provide a banquet hall for the citizens of Peoria?
Sell it.
I agree, but looking at the utility expense ($66,500) who could afford to buy it? That’s $5,500 a month just for utilities. Clearly the building wasn’t designed with cost in mind. As Will Rogers said, “It’s a good thing we don’t get all the government we pay for.”
Yeeee-ouch. is that a standard utility bill for buildings of that size?
“Since when is it the city’s responsibility to provide a banquet hall for the citizens of Peoria?”
Since the taxpayers are paying for it and have been all along.
That’s the gas/electric cost Gary Sandberg posted at Peoria Pundit. Seems high to me as well, but it is a huge space with very tall ceilings, and since hot air rises I suppose they need to keep it extra warm for people to be comfortable at floor level. I wonder how warm they keep it when no one is there? When I’m out of town in the winter, I turn my heat down to 55. Doesn’t take that long to warm up when I get home. If that utility figure is correct, you just have to wonder about the design, insulation, furnace efficiency, air conditioning efficiency, etc.
Give it to the museum. Gee, why renovate or use old buildings when we can try [and fail] to raise 1 billion dollars?
With some modifications, it might make a good train depot if Amtrak ever came to Peoria.
All that money, and the only benefit that I have seen is the nice public bathrooms for riverfront events.. It sure beats the nasty port-a-pottys… especially during Oktoberfest 🙂
The numbers I posted were not my numbers but rather those of staff (Steve Van Winkle, Public Works) that are included in the 2007 budget as adopted by City Council yesterday by a 8-2, 1 vacant vote
The real descrepancy for me is the sewer number for the building vs the sewer number for the festival area and percentage relationship between sewer and water. the building sewer is 1/3 the cost of building water which seems out of wack compared to my residential bill for each, but then no one on the Council really wants to have questions asked