WSU Study on Downtown Wichita Arena Not Complete

by Bob Weeks on October 30, 2004

Government Accounting Standards Board Statement 34 requires governments to account for the cost of their assets, usually by stating depreciation expense each year. Through a series of email exchanges with Mr. Ed Wolverton, President of the Wichita Downtown Development Corporation, I have learned that the WSU Center for Economic Development and Business Research was not aware of this requirement when they prepared their forecast. Mr. Wolverton admitted this after checking with the study authors.

Mr. Chris Chronis, Chief Financial Officer of Sedgwick County, in an email conversation told me that the county will take depreciation expense for the downtown arena, or for a renovated Kansas Coliseum, for that matter.

I appeared in a story on a local television station where I presented research I had read showing that if new development occurs around a downtown arena, it would likely be economic activity that formerly took place somewhere else in town. This is the “substitution effect.” Mr. Wolverton appeared in the same story and state that due to time constraints, the WSU study did not study these effects.

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