Video Transcript:

JOANNE FARYON (Host): Earlier this week, Mayor Jerry Sanders backed a plan to expand the convention center in downtown San Diego. The expansion could cost as much as $53 million a year over the next 30 years. KPBS reporter Katie Orr has been covering the story, she joins me now. Now, Katie, the mayor is a big supporter of this. Why does he think we need a bigger convention center?

KATIE ORR (Reporter): Well, the mayor thinks it's just a good investment for the city. He says that every dollar the city invests in the convention center, they get $2.46 back. He says last year the convention center generated $30 million in tax revenue. And he says at it's current size, it turns away a year's worth of business every year, so you know to him that's money that the city is losing that we could potentially get if the center was bigger.

FARYON: But let's talk about the price tag. $53 million for the next 30 years. That's nearly a billion dollars. How are we going to pay for this?

ORR: Well it's certainly not cheap, and the mayor has a task force studying the expansion right now. They're going to make the recommendation later on whether or not they think we should go forward with this. And they had a presentation from some consultants who study expansions around the country. Basically it comes down to taxes and fees - increasing taxes on hotel rooms, increasing taxes on food and beverages. They talked about adding one to two dollars to the price of tickets for Sea World and the Zoo. Also fees on taxi rides.

FARYON: Does the mayor really think that right now people are going to go for more fees, higher taxes?

ORR: Well he says that it wouldn't be the citizens of San Diego who would really be paying these fees. He admits that the plans need to be refined a little bit, because they could apply to the whole city, they could apply to just downtown.

FARYON: And you talked to him earlier about this didn't you?

ORR: I did. I spoke with him and this is what he had to say.

MAYOR JERRY SANDERS: Well I think that, first of all, probably a lot of those fees or taxes would be collected from tourists. If the convention centers bringing a lot of people - which it does - to hotels and there's another one percent on their hotel bill, then thats going directly to the tourists. Sea World and the Zoo were also mentioned, and they get a lot of business from the tourism industry with people coming in and seeing that. A taxi charge, going to the convention center, the only people going to the convention center normally are tourism.

FARYON: Katie, when we hear about these types of expansions, normally they - what we also hear from economists - they create low paying jobs. And we know from various San Diego reports for every eight low paying jobs, that this county creates, we create only one high paying job. Isn't this going to be much of the same?

ORR: Well, that's what I asked the mayor and he had this to say about it.

SANDERS: We need the full mix of jobs. And if you talk to labor unions, the convention center is a labor place where they get paid wages that are labor wages, they like that. We can't have everybody working in biotech, we need that full mix and what it does is it helps us to  allow that mixture of different jobs. Thats also a lot of people who work, small business owners, there's 12,000 jobs generated just with the size of it right now. A lot of those are small business owners and others that have their own companies. So it's a full mix of jobs.

FARYON: Katie, what's next in terms of this project?

ORR: Well, as I said, the task force is studying this. They have another meeting on July 6th at the convention center. They will continue talking about the financing. They're going to, hopefully, make a recommendation - that's what they want to do in August - to the mayor about whether to go forward and if they do go forward, how to go about that. But it's far from a done deal, you know, the city council will have to weigh in if there's issues of taxes, it might have to go to a public vote, so I think this is probably just the very beginning of the process.

FARYON: Thank you, Katie Orr, for being here.

ORR: Thank you.

FARYON: Weighing in now with their opinions on an expanded convention center are the editors. Joining me are JW August, managing editor of KGTV, and Tom York, editor of the San Diego Business Journal. Tom York, does San Diego need a bigger convention center?

TOM YORK (San Diego Business Journal): Well, I think the question is the timing. Right now we're in a severe recession and the hotel industry is under duress, especially in Downtown San Diego. We just reported last week that the W Hotel, the owners of that hotel had to give the keys back to their financiers - we've heard through our sources that there's probably more of that in the works. So does it make sense to start adding taxes to visitors at a time when the hotel industry is just trying to attract more visitors - just trying to survive? And I think the question has to be carefully looked at.

FARYON: JW, when it comes to major bookings, San Diego's convention center is ranked 6th in the country. Do we need to be number one?

JW AUGUST (10 News): I don't think we can ever out Las Vegas, Vegas. I think that's out of the question. Is this what the people of San Diego need and want? I think that's the question. I do think it should stay on the table and we should continue to discuss it, because we do have to look into the future, It's not like they're going to build it next week.

FARYON: Now, this is something the mayor really wants to see. So, lets look at why. We know that hotel tax brings in about $150 million a year in revenue, but $90 million goes to the general fund. So when we're looking at this kind of investment, we may know why the city council may want to make this investment, but in therms of the people who live here should we be investing in an industry that produces more low paying jobs, more tourism jobs. Tom?

YORK: Well I think there's an argument to be made for building new structures. Obviously there's the construction workers - they would benefit from it during the construction process. And then the low paid workers, I think that there's some argument to be made for having jobs at the lower end of the economic spectrum. But it's a very complex project and we have to weigh the outcome And I think a lot of times the numbers done in these studies are goosed, they're not honest numbers, and you have to look at those very carefully and really examine whether or not the projections are realistic.

FARYON: Quick question for you, JW, there's three big building projects on the table. How would you prioritize between expanding the convention center, building a new downtown library, or a new City Hall? Which would you choose?

AUGUST: New downtown library. Long overdue.