Simon Says Let’s Play Chess

An $830,000 change order is enough to make even the most sane and rational government get a little flustered, so given what we’ve got here in Augusta, it’s no surprise that things surrounding the TEE Center’s smoke exhaust system got a little crazy at Monday’s committee meetings. And given the relationship the city has with Augusta Riverfront LLC, the group that will manage the TEE Center and already manages the convention center while also running the Marriott it’s all connected to, it looks totally ridiculous for the government to spend taxpayer’s money to upgrade the standards of its own building just to comply with the Marriott’s higher (and more expensive) standards. Throw in Augusta Riverfront’s relationship with Billy Morris, who is pretty much Public Enemy #1 to much of Augusta, and the stage is set. The Commission even heard from Augusta Riverfront’s Paul Simon, Public Enemy #2, and you know what? He made sense. First, he talked about all the benefits that being associated with the world’s number one hotel provides, but that’s stuff people either already know or dismiss as PR (or BS), so pretty quickly he laid the facts on the table. When the city voted to build the TEE Center, it had to be built to Marriott standards or Augusta Riverfront wouldn’t be able to operate it, and the commission approved Augusta Riverfront as the operator. That paradox ceases to be an intellectual exercise real quick, though. If you run afoul of Marriott, Augusta Riverfront can’t operate the facility, and if Augusta Riverfront can’t operate the facility, the city would have to separate the TEE Center from the hotel and from the convention center it already owns, which is not only impractical, it’s basically impossible. And Augusta Riverfront knows it. J.R. Hatney, though, didn’t want to hear it. “How can they mandate what this government does?” he asked. “They can’t to you,” Simon said. “But they can to us, because we have a contract with them.” Hatney wanted to know when Simon knew about the requirements, and Simon flat out told him that it wasn’t his job to tell them. “It’s not our place to come meet with you,” he said. “You’re building the building because we, together, have a contract that you will build a building if we would put up the land. We put up the land. We’ll manage it if you build it. That’s the only thing we’re getting out of it.” “You put up the land?” Hatney shot back. “We own the land?” “We’re giving the land to you.” Still unsatisfied, Hatney wanted to know about the liens, and Simon tried to explain it to him. “So I have a letter from the bank that tells me a year and a half ago that if we consented to agree to what they’ve agreed to do, then they will release the lien,” he said. “And so that’s where we are now. They’re ready to release it.” As for the air rights, Simon didn’t shy away from that, either. “That wasn’t our fault,” he said. “We were going to give you land, but we had to change it because of your tax attorney out of Atlanta. You all voted on it – you know about it. But the point is, that’s why we didn’t give you the land. But what difference does it make.” “It makes a big difference,” Hatney responded. “We were instructed that the land was going to be donated to the city before that $12 million building was built on it.” “Talk with your tax lawyer,” Simon said. “Now, since then we’ve agreed that we will take easement and not own land, but you know what happens by doing that? We don’t have to pay any property taxes. We would have been paying the other way. It doesn’t matter to us whether we had air rights or an easement. It doesn’t make any difference.” How this impacts the whole TEE Center conversation is unclear, but it does put Simon squarely on the record, which ought to stand for something. Whether it does or not – only time will tell.You Might Also Like: