By Laura Spencer
Kansas City, MO – After more than six months of negotiations, the Kansas City Council Thursday approved an agreement for the forty-seven million dollar parking garage for the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts.
Some of the sticking points included a funding mechanism and control of the one thousand space garage just south of the center. City Manager Wayne Cauthen says the agreement calls for the city to own and operate the garage and gambling revenues will pay the debt service.
Cauthen says there's also an option to renegotiate: "Well, the bonds will be 30 years. And then what we're saying is every five years they can be automatic renewals. So every five years after the bonds have been sold or retired that they get renewals every five years. And we have an opportunity during the five years to look at the agreement to see if we want to do something different."
The $405 million Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts remains under construction near 16th and Broadway and is expected to open in the fall of 2010.