Columbus: A New Economy (how much, attorney, live)

[Columbusattorney]

Originally Posted by ATLCOL1

Columbus job market expected to recoup losses by 2011

Your earlier posts stated 2008 then 09....now it is 11 and Selig says 12 or 13.

They are describing jobs lost in Columbus since recession began....now what about the massive amount of jobs lost locally from 2000-2008?
I guess they will just push the date up to 2020 maybe....lol
1600 people apply for 56 jobs on saturday...now what does that say for the city?
The homestead exemption on home property taxes has offically been ended by the state and city taxpayers will soon be getting the bill.

[ATLCOL1]

National Infantry Museum Will Boost City's Economy

$91M Museum Expected to Have Major Impact on South Columbus

The National Infantry Museum and Soldier Center at Patriot Park, which opens its doors and exhibits to the world Friday, is poised to fire a $26.3 million economic shot across Columbus.

That’s the direct financial impact the long-awaited and highly heralded tribute to the nation’s foot soldier is expected to have on the city each year.

The basic statistics, researched by Columbus State University, tell part of the story:

• $26.3 million generated from hotel, restaurant, recreation, retail, transportation and miscellaneous sales.

• 520 jobs created through employment at the museum and other new businesses in the city that hire staff — and existing businesses that add employees — to take advantage of the surge in people visiting the facility and the city.

• Between 380,000 and 400,000 annual visitors to the museum located at 1775 Legacy Way, just outside of Fort Benning. Of that number, about 95 percent of those visitors are expected to be from out of town.

“Anytime a new facility like this opens up, it’s like a birthday present or a Christmas present,” said Peter Bowden, president and chief executive officer of the Columbus Convention & Visitors Bureau.

“We felt the same way when the RiverCenter (for the Performing Arts) came on line and when Port Columbus (Civil War Naval Museum) came on line,” he said. “It’s always good to add one more experience in the destination so that we become more diverse and more appealing to a broader audience. So, yeah, we can hardly wait.”

The $91 million museum is expected to have a major economic impact in the south Columbus area, which has been striving to revive itself after years of serving as a center for nightclubs and cheap motels.

But Bowden believes that with the large numbers of visitors projected to venture to the museum, its presence will be felt far beyond the south side.

“If it follows the pattern historically, the whole community will feel it because it’s not just hotels,” he said. “It’s restaurants, it’s buying gasoline, it’s dry cleaners. So the ripple effect will be throughout the city.”

The hotel sector should certainly benefit. There has been a building boom in recent years, with the city adding about 1,500 rooms to its hospitality base.

There are now about 4,600 rooms in Columbus alone. But several new properties have recently opened, including a Hampton Inn & Suites and Holiday Inn Express & Suites in Phenix City.

A Candlewood Suites and another Holiday Inn Express are under construction off Victory Drive, not far from the museum. They will join a Suburban Extended Stay that opened in the area about a year ago.

“We have turned the corner with south Columbus issues,” said Reggie Richards, general manager of the Suburban hotel and a longtime advocate of south side revitalization.

“I think finally that battleship has been turned around,” she said. “That has taken lots of work and constant plugging it and marketing it. Of course, the museum was the catalyst for it all along.”

The impact the museum will have on the city ranges far from the occupancy rates at the hotels, said Richards, noting her own property tops 80-percent filled regularly. Much of her business is military.

“There are the gas stations, the banks. Everybody is going to get so much business,” she said. “I understand the McDonald’s down here is the highest-grossing McDonald’s in Columbus. And their numbers should be jumping” with the new museum.

But while the coming week will be like the night before Christmas for many local businesses, some are taking a wait-and-see attitude. And some don’t even know the facility exists.

“I didn’t know about the museum. Thanks for the warning,” Tameka Johnson, manager of the Arby’s eatery on Victory Drive, said Friday when informed as many as 400,000 museum visitors could be driving by her doors. The Arby’s, one of many fast-food outlets in the area, is not much more than a mile from the stately red-brick museum and its impressive rotunda.

Harold Encarnacion, owner of Millie’s International grocery market and restaurant on South Lumpkin Road, said he has yet to see any increased business from the museum’s soft opening in March. But he’s hoping for the best.

“We’re trying to get ready for it, but I haven’t seen nothing yet,” he said, pointing out the economy in general has hurt sales. “It’s hit and miss. One day you’re busy, the next day you’re real slow.”

That could change in a hurry if several thousand vehicles carrying hungry tourists and families of infantry training graduates descend on the area after the June 19 opening.
They’ll also need gas, and June Miller, manager of the Citgo Food Store on South Lumpkin Road, hopes she will snag extra business. But she’s skeptical, even with her service station and convenience store being one of the closest to the museum, about a half mile away.

Miller’s concern stems from Fort Benning recently closing the South Lumpkin Road entrance to the post at 1 p.m. each day, essentially cutting off the flow of her typical military clientele.

There’s also the fact that most visitors to the museum are generally being funneled by signs and other marketing tools to its entrance on the Benning Boulevard side of the facility.

“They have that graduation every Thursday and Friday. So we got quite a few (out of towners) in today,” Miller said Friday. “But I think they just kind of stumbled onto the road. That’s the problem, they’re just stumbling through here. I guess they all think they’ve got to go back the same way they went in.”

Miller is hoping the city will put up a sign letting visitors know there are two avenues for entering the museum — Benning Boulevard and South Lumpkin Road.
But, ultimately, Bowden at the CVB thinks there will be enough economic pie to go around. Part of the reason is the emphasis his office is putting on selling military heritage attractions in the Columbus area. Nearly half of his marketing budget goes toward that sector.

“Based on our research, the military market segment is one of our largest and continues to grow because of all the other things happening with Fort Benning,” he said. “More and more of the indicators are pointing to this being a significant attraction within the community.”

Bowden also is looking for the museum to keep the momentum going for overall city visitation. In fiscal year 2007-2008, 1.1 million people stopped in Columbus for business, reunions and to tour the sights. That translated to visitors spending $378 million.

The CVB chief has a strong hunch his newest attraction will perform well and possibly push that number higher in the coming year as it becomes nationally known.
“The Infantry Museum, I would like to think, is going to be one of those top, must-see things,” he said.

[Columbusattorney]

Originally Posted by ATLCOL1

National Infantry Museum Will Boost City's Economy

$91M Museum Expected to Have Major Impact on South Columbus

520 jobs created due to the SURGE?
Regardless of the low hanging fruit self promotions in the paper or what other cities are doing Columbus is hurting and it is going to get much worse by the end of the year.
City leaders and local employers have made this very clear to me over the past 2-3 months and are not impressed with current activity levels or future stats.
It is very much the old "what if you build something and nobody came" syndrome which has happened over and over locally.....a small crowd of lookyloos and curiosity seekers and then the attraction staggers on.

Some businesses did not even know it was there and trainee graduates have been warning their parents/friends/family not to stop anywhere in South Columbus or stay at any motel/hotels below airport thruway.
Even Commerce reps admitted they tell their clients to stay and dine around North bypass.

Different day/different magazine/different place.



By Tony Pugh

WASHINGTON — Unlike the labor market collapse that killed millions of U.S. jobs in a matter of months, the nation’s return to peak employment will not be nearly as uniform nor as swift.
While signs indicate that the worst of the recession may be over, only six metropolitan areas across the country are expected to regain their pre-recession employment levels by the end of 2009, according to projections from IHS Global Insight, a leading economic forecaster.
The areas poised for a jobs rebound later this year are: Anchorage, Alaska; Champaign-Urbana, Ill.; Coeur d’Alene, Idaho; Columbia, Mo.; Laredo, Texas; and the Houma-Bayou Cane-Thibodaux areas of Louisiana.

Only five areas are expected to see a similar jobs recovery in 2010: Las Cruces, N.M., and El Paso, San Antonio and the McAllen-Edinburg-Pharr and Austin-Round Rock areas of Texas.
Most of the country — 286 of 325 metro areas covered in the IHS analysis — aren’t likely to regain their pre-recession employment levels until at least 2012.

[Akhenaton06]

Well damn, what is Columbus supposed to do? Seems as the city is at least moving in the right direction. Give them credit for that at least.

[ATLCOL1]

Originally Posted by Akhenaton06

Well damn, what is Columbus supposed to do? Seems as the city is at least moving in the right direction. Give them credit for that at least.

Thank you. This guy has to turn everything someone says into something negative. I am sure he is disappointed that NCR is creating nearly 900 good paying jobs in Columbus. What is it with some people?

[yerocal]

Originally Posted by ATLCOL1

Thank you. This guy has to turn everything someone says into something negative.

No you have him mixed up with BULLDAWGFAN

[ATLCOL1]

Originally Posted by yerocal

No you have him mixed up with BULLDAWGFAN

LOL, I know exactly where you are coming from!

[Columbusattorney]

Originally Posted by Akhenaton06

Well damn, what is Columbus supposed to do? Seems as the city is at least moving in the right direction. Give them credit for that at least.

The city isn't moving it is everything around and outside of it.....
Columbus hasn't succeeded in doing much of anything on its own.
Like patting an alcoholic on the back for drinking 2 six packs instead of a case......rofl

[Columbusattorney]

Originally Posted by ATLCOL1

Thank you. This guy has to turn everything someone says into something negative. I am sure he is disappointed that NCR is creating nearly 900 good paying jobs in Columbus. What is it with some people?

Not as disappointed as you are....lol
You never answer posts correcting you on other threads but only when someone comes to your rescue.
Anybody on here can go back over your previous posts and see the wheres and whens as they speak for themselves with many conflicting statements.
Don't take my word for it.
I am still waiting for your Selig and other projections to come through as are many other folks in the city.

[Columbusattorney]

Originally Posted by ATLCOL1

LOL, I know exactly where you are coming from!

Me too!!
Like Skelo and Columbus1984.....rofl