{"id":3711,"date":"2013-10-13T12:55:27","date_gmt":"2013-10-13T12:55:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/highplainsblogger.wordpress.com\/?p=3711"},"modified":"2013-10-13T12:55:27","modified_gmt":"2013-10-13T12:55:27","slug":"amarillo-seeks-to-build-an-arc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=3711","title":{"rendered":"Amarillo seeks to build an ARC"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n

Something has gotten into Amarillo’s leadership.<\/p>\n

It’s gotten a bit bolder of late. Timidity no longer seems to be an option.<\/p>\n

Consider the Amarillo Recreation Center bond issue on the ballot next month. The city wants to build a massive sports complex in the southeast section of town. It’ll cost $38 million or so to construct. A citizens group is pledging to raise $6 million of it from private donations and say it’s about halfway there.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.connectamarillo.com\/news\/story.aspx?id=956835#.UldHwkoo6t8<\/p>\n

I was a bit slow to catch up to this story, but the plan as I understand it looks sound.<\/p>\n

William Ware and Trevor Caviness, two young men whose families have extensive business backgrounds in Amarillo, visited the Rotary Club of Amarillo this past week and made their pitch.<\/p>\n

My favorite line came from Caviness, who said the bond issue would tack on 25 cents per $100 valuation to homes in Amarillo, meaning that the owner of a $100,000 home would pay an additional $25 annually in property taxes. “That’s about the cost of two large pizzas,” Caviness said.<\/p>\n

I’m always intrigued at the metaphors people come up with to make large expenses seem so affordable.<\/p>\n

In reality, though, the ARC seems like a good deal for the city.<\/p>\n

Ware said Amarillo is losing a lot of tournament business to other cities with athletic complexes comparable to what’s being pitched for Amarillo. The ARC will contain fast-pitch softball fields, soccer fields, an indoor swimming complex, dressing rooms … all of it.<\/p>\n

Plus, it will be next to two municipal golf courses, meaning that if your kids and\/or your spouse want to use the ARC, you can take your clubs to the first tee and play a round of golf.<\/p>\n

Ware noted that the ARC will be good for business. It will bring people here from elsewhere; they’ll spend money in Amarillo, generating sales tax revenue that helps fuel City Hall’s maintenance and operations budget — and presumably helps keep Amarillo’s municipal property tax among the lowest in the state.<\/p>\n

I am persuaded that the ARC is worth building.<\/p>\n\n

Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Something has gotten into Amarillo’s leadership. It’s gotten a bit bolder of late. Timidity no longer seems to be an option. Consider the Amarillo Recreation Center bond issue on the ballot next month. The city wants to build a massive sports complex in the southeast section of town. It’ll cost $38 million or so to … Continue reading Amarillo seeks to build an ARC<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[280,290,434],"class_list":["post-3711","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-amarillo-athletics","tag-amarillo-city-hall","tag-arc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3711"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3711\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}