The New Orleans Saints and the State of Louisiana are in the midst of negotiations that will determine whether the Saints remain in New Orleans. Sports subsidies present communities with difficult political and financial decisions. In this report, BGR seeks to provide policymakers and the public with background information relevant to current negotiations with the Saints.
Overview Questions for a New Parish Council is the second in a two-part 2019 Candidate Q&A Election Series providing the views of candidates for Jefferson Parish government on important public policy issues. Yesterday, BGR released the responses of the candidates for Parish President. Questions for a New Parish Council provides voters with the candidates’ answers […]
Overview Questions for a New Parish President is the first in a two-part 2019 Candidate Q&A Election Series providing the views of candidates for Jefferson Parish government on important public policy issues. On September 13, 2019, BGR released the responses of the Parish Council candidates. Questions for a New Parish President provides voters with the […]
Overview In this report, BGR compares Orleans Parish hotel taxes to best practices for taxation as well as state and national norms, focusing primarily on the share of revenue available for general municipal purposes.
Overview Today, BGR releases an open letter to the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. The letter sets forth BGR’s concerns about a Convention Center consultant’s recent analysis of the feasibility and economic impact of a proposed 1,200-room convention hotel. The letter seeks to reconcile the consultant’s findings with the analysis in BGR’s July 19 […]
OVERVIEW In this report, BGR provides an analytical framework for evaluating the necessity and size of a private development team’s requested public contributions to design, build and operate a 1,200-room hotel attached to the New Orleans Ernest N Morial Convention Center. BGR estimates the proposed contributions – some of which would remain in place for 40 […]
OVERVIEW This report is the latest installment in BGR’s Candidate Q&A Election Series. The new report consolidates and reissues the responses of the newly elected City of New Orleans mayor and councilmembers who completed BGR’s surveys last fall on important issues facing City government. We encourage citizens to revisit the issues by reviewing the BGR […]
Overview For the October 14, 2017 primary elections in New Orleans, BGR provided voters with its 2017 Candidate Q&A Election Series. BGR submitted questions to all mayoral and City Council candidates on public safety, infrastructure and other important public policy issues facing the City of New Orleans government. BGR compiled the answers of the candidates who […]
Overview In Convention Center Bill Highlights Need to Rethink Local Taxation, BGR addresses a bill that would grant taxing authority to the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center’s economic development district. The release calls for a comprehensive re-evaluation of Orleans Parish taxes, with an eye toward aligning tax revenues with the city’s most pressing needs.
Overview In this release, BGR examines a 2013 legislative proposal to authorize a hotel assessment in New Orleans.
Overview In On the Ballot: November 6, 2012, BGR examines three proposed constitutional amendments, two propositions pertaining to multiple parishes in the New Orleans area, a proposed change to the City of New Orleans charter and two local tax propositions. The three constitutional amendments would strengthen gun rights, provide an additional homestead exemption to spouses […]
Overview BGR examines charter amendments, tax propositions and state constitutional amendments on the October and November 2011 ballots. The October 22 ballot includes a Jefferson Parish charter amendment to establish the Office of Inspector General and an Ethics and Compliance Commission, as well as a related property tax to fund both entities. It also includes […]
Overview The Bureau of Governmental Research made presentations before the New Orleans Tax Fairness Commission on February 3, 2011 and February 23, 2011. The first presentation, Taxation in New Orleans, examines the City’s tax picture, with particular emphasis on property taxes. Read it here. The second presentation, The Industrial Development Board and PILOT Subsidies, provides […]
Overview In this report entitled In the Private Interest: A Review of the Lake Forest Plaza TIF Proposal, BGR analyzes a tax increment financing (TIF) proposal by the owners of the former mall site to use public funds to clear up debts on the site and redevelop it.
Overview On February 3, 2009, BGR sent a letter to Councilman Arnold Fielkow, Chairman of City Council’s Special Projects and Economic Development Committee, on the use and operation of the city’s Economic Development Fund. The letter recommends that the city abandon the current practice of directing grants to a handful of individual business ventures or […]
Overview Look Before You Leap: Tax Increment Financing in Jefferson Parish provides an overview of tax increment financing (TIF) and describes four TIF districts proposed in Jefferson Parish. It also reviews the perceived benefits of TIF, as well as the pitfalls and potential abuses of the mechanism. It concludes with recommendations concerning the future use of […]
Overview The City of New Orleans is working on a draft policy governing tax increment financing. BGR submitted comments on the February 2008 draft at the request of the City Council’s Special Development Projects and Economic Development Committee. The letter recommends that the City look to San Antonio’s TIF policy for guidance. In November, BGR […]
Overview The Bureau of Governmental Research analyzes four proposed amendments to the State constitution and one proposed amendment to the St. Tammany Parish home rule charter. The report covers amendments that will go before voters on October 20, 2007. Two of the proposed constitutional amendments deal with State supplemental pay for local public safety employees. The […]
Overview In the face of mounting developer requests for subsidies, this release calls for the City of New Orleans and the Industrial Development Board of New Orleans to stop approving subsidies until they have implemented promised policies and procedures.
Overview In Seeking Subsidies on Top of Subsidies, BGR raises concerns about requests for local property tax subsidies to housing developments that have already received subsidies through state and federal programs. The report is a follow-up to Protecting New Orleans’ Tax Base: Which PILOTs Should Fly?
Overview In Protecting New Orleans’ Tax Base: Which PILOTs Should Fly? BGR addresses New Orleans’ system for handling property tax subsidies through the payment in lieu of taxes (PILOT) mechanism. This report comes at a time when requests for such subsidies are increasing.
Overview The New Orleans Saints and the State of Louisiana are in the midst of negotiations that will determine whether the Saints remain in New Orleans. Sports subsidies present communities with difficult political and financial decisions. In this report, BGR seeks to provide policymakers and the public with background information relevant to current negotiations with […]
Overview To provide citizens and government with a better understanding of their investment, BGR presents in this report an overview of economic development expenditures in New Orleans. BGR also provides a detailed summary of individual funding streams to supplement the report.
Overview BGR studies the use of tax increment financing (TIF) in New Orleans. BGR reviews the use of TIF in general and in New Orleans in particular, and makes recommendations.
Overview On February 2, 2002, the voters of New Orleans will consider a proposition to authorize the extension of the property tax millage for the New Orleans Business and Industrial District. The district has since been renamed the New Orleans Regional Business Park.
Overview In this report, BGR reviews the four proposed changes in the state constitution that voters will decide on November 7, 2000. The amendments would: (1) authorize the state to establish a corporation to be the state’s principal economic development organization (Louisiana Inc.) and to exempt it from civil service; (2) change state individual income […]
Large portions of Convention Center Boulevard are closed for the entire month of December. It’s just the latest in a series of intermittent closures on the Central Business District thoroughfare as the street is permanently converted from four lanes...
The governing body of the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center set its 2020 budget at its Wednesday meeting. The Convention Center board was also expected to approve a contract with Populous, a Missouri-based architecture firm, to be...
On Friday, The New Orleans Tourism Marketing Corporation, a public municipal entity, provided some of the first details into what it will look like once the majority of its staff, mission and funding are absorbed by the private nonprofit...
One of the reasons you love Think504 is that we keep you informed about important political and civic decisions you have to make. So when you go into the voting booth (Early voting Nov 2-9 Election Day Nov 16) to elect...
The New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center reached a deal last week with a consortium of private developers to build a new 1,200-room hotel on the center’s upriver side, with public subsidies amounting to an estimated $114 million,...
At a public meeting Monday night, the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center’s governing body touted its plans for a $557 million hotel as a project that would bring jobs and tourism dollars to the city. But a few residents...
Today BGR releases Questions for a New Parish Council, the second in a two-part report series providing the views of candidates for Jefferson Parish government on important public policy issues. Yesterday, BGR released the responses of the candidates for...
Today BGR releases Questions for a New Parish President, the first in a two-part series of reports providing the views of candidates for Jefferson Parish government on important public policy issues. Tomorrow, BGR will release the responses of the...
The hospitality industry in New Orleans brings in $8.7 billion per year, according to a report commissioned by the city in 2018. But while the industry thrives, many of the city’s cooks, servers and bartenders must walk a financial tightrope trying...
The controversial 1,200-room hotel proposed for the upriver end of the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center passed a major milestone on Friday, when a hard-fought legislative bill laying out the terms of the project was signed by Gov. John Bel...
New Orleans will receive tens of millions of dollars to replace antiquated sewage pipes, fix faulty drainage pumps and mend pothole-filled roads, mostly by levying higher taxes on visitors, after the state Senate on Sunday gave final approval to...
For generations, the mayor of New Orleans was supposed to be a native, a smooth political operator and, it almost goes without saying, a man. In her history-making 2017 campaign, Mayor LaToya Cantrell bet that New Orleans was ready...
The city of New Orleans’ crumbling infrastructure will receive an infusion of tens of millions of dollars under a deal announced Monday by Gov. John Bel Edwards and Mayor LaToya Cantrell after weeks of hard-fought negotiations between their aides...
The closing of a deal to secure millions of dollars in immediate and continuing money for the city’s drainage infrastructure and the Sewerage & Water Board appears imminent for Mayor LaToya Cantrell. The negotiations in some respects could put more money in the hands of the...
The Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, a major player in the New Orleans tourism industry, is sitting on some $200 million in tax money — funds generated for a center expansion that was scrapped after Hurricane Katrina. Some critics, including...
America faces a crisis at home more urgent than any before — other than Pearl Harbor and 9/11. That crisis is our crumbling and badly managed infrastructure. Some may call me an alarmist, but I don’t expect many New Orleanians...
New Orleans developer and hotelier Joe Jaeger announced Saturday that he is withdrawing from the team seeking to build a heavily subsidized and thus controversial hotel at the upriver end of the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. Earlier in...
In a hardball move against the hospitality industry, New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell took her fight for tourism tax dollars to the Louisiana Legislature Monday, with members of her administration testifying in favor of a series of bills to...
Hear WWL Radio’s Tommy Tucker talk with Amy Glovinsky, President/CEO BGR (Bureau of Governmental Research), about the City’s efforts to get a greater share of the tax revenue from the tourism industry. Click here to read BGR’s report on...
The contentious debate over how to use New Orleans tourism tax dollars that has rumbled along largely behind closed doors spilled out in public Wednesday at The New Orleans Advocate’s tourism summit. A high-level panel that included Mayor LaToya...
An expert panel on tourism brought together a host of important industries and ideas Tuesday morning in downtown New Orleans. The forum, hosted at The New Orleans Advocate, delved into several subjects integral to the city’s tourism future and...
It’s 2019, but looking at some of the city’s old and antiquated infrastructure, it doesn’t feel like it. We have a pumping system that includes parts that are over a hundred years old, and a water and sewer system...
Build it and they will come. That’s the rosy forecast by officials from the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, who are in the beginning stages of a $1.1 billion spending plan that they say will bring hordes of...
Less than a month away from the start of the 2019 legislative session, Mayor LaToya Cantrell’s legislative agenda is being shaped by her push to divert millions of tax dollars from state-sponsored tourism and sports agencies to helping meet New...
Two groups — one created by the mayor and the governor, the other consisting of tourism and business leaders working behind the scenes — are zeroing in on sources of money that could help address the New Orleans Sewerage & Water...
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The Orleans Parish tax assessor says he’s told convention center officials that a $558 million hotel they’re proposing probably would not be exempt from property taxes — something some center board members say is essential....
Community activism is alive and well in New Orleans at the grassroot level. One group, The New Orleans Peoples’ Assembly (NOPA), is in the vanguard of addressing social injustice and human rights violations by people with both political and...
With the Louisiana Legislature convening in exactly one month, the first proposals focused on raising more money for New Orleans road and Sewerage & Water Board repairs have begun to take shape. The chances for major success, though, appear slim at this point,...
Erroll Williams, the Orleans Parish tax assessor, is complicating plans for a hotel that officials of the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center want to build with tens of millions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies. Williams told Convention Center officials...
A respected investment banker has a plan that he says could save the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center hundreds of millions of dollars in its controversial deal to build a 1,200-room hotel. So far, the response from the center’s...
This year agencies in New Orleans charged with overseeing the Mercedes-Benz Superdome, running the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center and promoting tourism in the city will do so with the help of more than $160 million in tax dollars....
New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell has signaled she wants $75 million for city infrastructure repairs straight from the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center’s reserve account, tapping money from hotel tax revenues that Gov. John Bel Edwards, key state lawmakers and tourism industry leaders have said should be...
NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) – Mayor LaToya Cantrell wants millions of dollars from the Convention Center and said the city is not getting its fair share of hotel tax money, when compared with other major cities. “I have recommended a...
What was originally meant to be a temporary move to ease the construction of the Superdome may still be costing the city an estimated $12 million dollars in 2019, according to a recent report. A recent report from the...
Amy Glovinsky and Paul Rioux of the Bureau of Governmental Research joined Newell to talk about the tourism dollar to the state budget.
The old idiom that nothing is certain but death and taxes remains true, with the possible addition of Roger Goodell’s loathing of the Saints to round out the list. The certainty surrounding taxes, however, is in the paying of...
New Orleans City Councilwoman Kristin Gisleson Palmer is calling for an end to a longtime arrangement that diverts about half of the Regional Transit Authority’s hotel tax revenues to the tourism industry. A one-percent sales tax — approved in...
NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) -The City of New Orleans wants to spread the wealth from hotel tax funding. The Bureau of Governmental Research will share its findings Tuesday on how the tax money could be used to improve city services....
Mayor LaToya Cantrell’s effort to get more of New Orleans’ hotel-motel taxes into the city’s general fund got a boost when the Bureau of Governmental Research (BGR), a nonpartisan good government group, made the case that the city should increase hotel-motel...
The Bureau of Governmental Research has waded into the big-dollar tax dispute between Mayor LaToya Cantrell and the tourism industry with a recommendation that would deliver more dollars to the city of New Orleans – as Cantrell is seeking....
Restoring a 1 percent sales tax on New Orleans hotels would be a step too much for the city’s tourism industry to bear, leading industry representatives said Wednesday (Jan. 30), responding to a new watchdog report that called for the extra...
NEW ORLEANS The New Orleans government’s share of taxes from hotel rooms in the tourism-dependent city should increase by more than $12 million a year, an independent research group said in a report released Wednesday. Reviving a debate involving city...
A new report by a nonprofit group says the city of New Orleans should get to keep more tax dollars then it’s currently getting. That report came from the Bureau of Governmental Research. View video here.
NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) – A leading local research group published a comprehensive report on New Orleans hotel-motel taxes, which shows the city lagging far behind when it comes to using hotel tax revenues to help fund city services. Since...
A new report from the Bureau of Governmental Research released on Wednesday found a lack of accountability and transparency when it comes to New Orleans hotel tax revenue, and recommended that the city get at least $12 million more per year,...
A one-percent tax on New Orleans hotel sales should return to city coffers, as it was decades ago before that local tax was halted to let the state collect its own tax revenue to build the Superdome, says a new report...
The Louisiana Stadium and Exposition District, the state entity with oversight of Mercedes-Benz Superdome and Smoothie King Center, raked in an additional $2.6 million in hotel taxes in 2017, pushing its revenue from tourist-related taxes to a record high,...
Amid new pressure from unions and an ongoing debate over whether the city’s hospitality and tourism industry is doing enough to support its mostly low-wage workers, a local nonprofit research group has released a report estimating that the industry’s...
Facing political pressure to share some of their hotel tax revenue with city agencies, New Orleans tourism leaders on Thursday proposed an alternative: a new hotel tax that would generate $6.7 million a year for municipal infrastructure projects. But...
New Orleans hospitality industry and business representatives are pitching a plan to raise $81 million in one-time money to plan and undertake fixes to drainage and other city infrastructure. Mayor LaToya Cantrell panned the proposal shortly after it was made public...
As negotiations continue behind the scenes over the terms of the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center’s proposed 1,200-room high-rise Omni Hotel, the city’s property tax assessor says he is skeptical that the $557.5 million project would qualify for the...
A plan by New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell to ask state lawmakers to shift some hotel taxes from tourism to the ailing infrastructure of the Sewerage & Water Board was dealt a major, and likely fatal, blow on Tuesday...
Governor John Bel Edwards presented at a BGR Breakfast Briefing on State of Louisiana priorities of local importance. BGR expresses its appreciation to Governor Edwards and to our attendees for their presence and participation in the Q&A that followed...
The would-be developers of the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center’s proposed $557.5 million, 1,200-room Omni Hotel have released the first design draft of the project’s exterior. Negotiations are ongoing and expected to wrap up by early 2019 between the New Orleans...
The developer of a proposed 1,200-room Ernest N. Morial Convention Center hotel has released a rendering of the structure, a $558 million addition to the facility along the Mississippi River in New Orleans. Dallas-based Matthews Southwest Hospitality is seeking...
Let New Orleans drown in water and red ink or stop giving special interests money to finance their real-life Monopoly game? It should be a no-brainer for Louisiana lawmakers. Earlier this month, Mayor LaToya Cantrell executed a campaign promise...
New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell built her political career by being a disruptor, and she won election with 60 percent of the vote, so clearly that’s a quality her constituents wanted in their new leader. Her disruptive side was...
Louisiana state Senate President John Alario on Friday threw cold water on Mayor LaToya Cantrell’s tentative plan to try to shift tax revenue away from local tourism agencies to help pay for improving New Orleans’ antiquated drainage, water and sewerage systems....
When Mayor LaToya Cantrell addressed the Bureau of Governmental Research on Tuesday, she was quick to talk about her desire to add currently exempt property to the tax rolls while also re-distributing other tax dollars that are generated in...
I read with interest a recent article in The Advocate in which a group that includes Joe Jaeger is asking for large subsidies to build a 1,200-room hotel next to the Morial Convention Center, for which the Bureau of...
The Ernest N. Morial New Orleans Convention Center’s proposal to build a 1,200-room hotel on its property is drawing scrutiny from a good government watchdog group, which questions why the project is so reliant on public support in the...
NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) -The Bureau of Governmental Research, a watchdog group released an open-letter it sent to the New Orleans Convention Center Thursday which raises questions about the accuracy of a consultant’s analysis for a controversial hotel project the...
A local government watchdog offered a detailed rebuttal to arguments that it’s necessary for developers of a $558 million hotel project to receive public subsidies that will total hundreds of millions of dollars. The nonpartisan Bureau of Governmental Research...
The Bureau of Governmental Research (BGR) releases an open letter to the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. The letter sets forth BGR’s concerns about a Convention Center consultant’s recent analysis of the feasibility and economic impact of a proposed 1,200-room convention...
Convention Center officials on Wednesday (Aug. 22) released an economic impact study that showed a proposed 1,200-room Convention Center hotel would have an estimated $282 million economic impact. The study also shows the Convention Center hotel would generate about...
Hoping to counteract mounting criticism over plans to build a publicly subsidized 1,200-room hotel, Ernest N. Morial Convention Center officials on Wednesday endorsed a consultant’s view of the project’s potential benefits, which he estimated would be worth $282 million in...
NEW ORLEANS, LA (WVUE) – Residents packed the Convention Center board meeting Wednesday (Aug. 22) to voice their opinions on a multi-million-dollar hotel project proposed for the lot next to the facility. However, proponents say the 1,200-room hotel would...
NEW ORLEANS, LA (WVUE) – Leaders from the Convention Center are set to make their case for a proposed hotel on the river. It could cost hundreds of millions of dollars in public money. The Convention center argues that...
The Ernest N. Morial Convention Center Board would really like to build a hotel attached to the Convention Center — so badly it wants taxpayers to pay for much of it. Last month, the nonpartisan Bureau of Governmental Research...
New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell is voicing opposition to a proposal to build a 1,200-room hotel attached to the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center that would include a $41 million contribution from the Convention Center. Cantrell’s letter comes nearly a month...
NEW ORLEANS, LA (WVUE) – Mayor Latoya Cantrell is asking the Convention Center board to “defer all action” on a controversial plan to use hundreds of millions of public dollars to fund a new hotel. The mayor’s request comes just one month...
In the opening salvo in what could become a lengthy negotiation over whether the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center moves forward with its plans to build a high-rise hotel, Mayor LaToya Cantrell has expressed “grave concerns” about the large public subsidies...
A $557 million hotel proposed for the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center needs a thorough evaluation of the project’s need and financial details before an approval vote possibly late next month, according to a report released Thursday (July 19)...
A local government watchdog group is urging officials to take a more critical look at a request for hundreds of millions of dollars worth of public subsidies for a proposed high-rise hotel adjacent to the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. The nonpartisan...
Ernest N. Morial Convention Center officials are back at the negotiating table, hoping to finally realize their dream of building a high-rise anchor hotel and, in time, a retail and entertainment complex on a vacant 47-acre tract the center purchased nearly...
Today, the Bureau of Governmental Research (BGR) releases Public Contributions to Convention Center Hotel Demand Scrutiny. The report provides an analytical framework for evaluating the necessity and size of a private development team’s requested public contributions to design, build and operate a...
Second time’s the charm. That’s what members of the New Orleans Exhibition Hall Authority hope as they return to the negotiating table with a team of developers who have proposed building a $558 million, 1,200-room Omni Hotel at an...
After years of stalled negotiations, Ernest N. Morial Convention Center officials have returned to the drawing board as they seek ways to kick-start a potentially $1.5 billion riverfront development that would include a 1,200-room hotel, retail space, restaurants and entertainment...
Jerry Bologna (JEDCO President & CEO) and Robert Edgecombe (GCR, Inc. Urban Planner and Consultant) spoke at a BGR Breakfast Briefing in Jefferson Parish. This Breakfast Briefing was sponsored by IBERIABANK. Edgecombe presented Jefferson Parish demographic trends. Bologna followed with...
Released in 2015, BGR’s report The $1 Billion Question: Do the Tax Dedications in New Orleans Make Sense? serves as a critical fact base for Lee Zurik’s Finding the Funds. The investigative series looks into Convention Center taxes. For BGR’s complete analysis,...
