Politics Aside, the Numbers Don't Add Up for Dallas' NRA Convention
The National Rifle Association's national tent revival is coming to Dallas in May. Whether the city and its residents like it or not, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre and company have a valid contract, good for a free takeover of the Kay Bailey Hutchinson Convention Center on Cinco de Mayo weekend.
The Dallas Convention and Visitors Bureau, known colloquially as Visit Dallas, believed that booking the NRA would be such a boon to the city that it agreed to cover $387,778 of the convention center's $410,618 rent when it wooed the organization in 2012. The city of Dallas is kicking in the remaining $22,840 as an incentive.
In the uproar that followed the murders of 15 high school kids in the country's latest mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, Visit Dallas had a ready set of talking points for those who wondered why Dallas, home to two of the country's most notorious examples of gun violence — the Kennedy assassination and the murder of five police officers in 2016 — was hosting the convention. The convention, it argued, was too valuable not to book, promising the city 50,000 hotel room stays from an estimated minimum of 20,000 visitors. The direct cash impact of those stays, according to Visit Dallas, is going to be $24 million, with an additional $18 million spent in the city when all is said and done, leaving a $42 million economic mark on the city.
Which would be fine, not really significant, but fine. The Dallas-Arlington-Fort Worth Metropolitan Statistical Area had a gross domestic product of about $512 billion in 2016, according to the Census Bureau. Stirring in another $42 million adds about 1/1000 of 1 percent to the region's economy, but at least it's something. The thing is, however, there's no proving Visit Dallas' numbers. Held up to even the slightest scrutiny, they begin to waver, big time.
Read more: http://www.dallasobserver.com/news/whats-the-nra-convention-worth-to-dallas-10464545