Tom Fortin, the Sudbury businessman, philanthropist and consistent critic of the new Gateway Casino and Entertainment Complex on The Kingsway has upped his game by hiring an experienced and well regarded economic consulting company to review the facts and impact of the Kingsway development.
It is not a flattering review by the firm urbanMetrics. UrbanMetrics based its review on this report prepared in 2017 by PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PWC).
Here are some of their conclusions:
- the relocation of the Sudbury Community Arena would be a lasting economic drain on downtown Sudbury;
- major sports leagues including the NHL and CHL have recognized that their most successful franchises are in downtown locations while the least successful franchises are on suburban sites;
- in making reference to the cities PWC consultants who helped guide the Council on its decision the report states “making a decision based on a subset of the PWC factors is a flawed approach”;
- the Kingsway Entertainment District would redirect business and investment away from other parts of Sudbury;
- the Kingsway would jeopardize the city's planned transformational large projects
- a casino would not significantly affect tourism to Sudbury and withdraw the vast majority of its support from within the city;
- Casino gaming extracts money from the local economy;
- the proposed Kingsway Entertainment District may not result in a significant number of new jobs for the city; and
- additional revenues to the city from the proposed Kingsway entertainment project may not be significant.
Not mincing any words the report states, “Our analysis concludes that the Kingsway Entertainment District is not a project that would make economic sense for the City of Greater Sudbury in that the benefits it would produce would be overshadowed by its economic and financial costs. Before investing further staff and financial resources in this project, we strongly recommend that the city proceed with the conduct of an independent economic and financial analysis of this project.”
There are of course differing views on this project in this city. It is also true that no one report on these matters is necessarily the gold standard.
This report does not provide a new data set. This report is a commentary from a professional and well-regarded organization that has done business with some of the top development companies in this country. It has also done important work with municipalities.
A reasonable person may not change their mind on this project as a result of the report. On the other hand, a reasonable person, given the startling critique of this decision from a creditable source, might want the city to slow down its unseemly race to approve it.
We live with this for the next 50 years. What, exactly, is the hurry?
Michael Atkins is the president and owner of the Laurentian Media Group, a diversified media company, which includes Northern Life, Sudbury.com, Sudbury Living Magazine and Northern Ontario Business.
