Costs still rise by millions for St. Louis convention center. ‘When does it end?’ (2024)

ST. LOUIS — Two years ago, the region’s convention and tourism chief said there was a plan to rein in the exploding costs of the troubled convention center expansion. The bid for the first half of the project had just come in $40 million over budget.

But Kitty Ratcliffe said the builder had already agreed to shaving $8 million off the contract.

“And it’s a minimum,” she said in April 2022.

That hasn’t happened. By the end of April of this year, city records show, change orders on the first phase had reached $7 million, leaving nearly all of the city’s contingency funds exhausted.

City records also show how officials pulled roughly $20 million in additional work into the first phase, at least in part as they worried they wouldn’t have enough money for a second phase.

Together, the records are the latest sign of distress on a critical project for downtown St. Louis and the region that surrounds it.

The expansion of the America’s Center, marketed as AC Next Gen, is intended to revitalize the complex and help it compete with rival cities. Denver, Indianapolis, and Nashville, Tennessee, have poured money into their own expansions, giving them a leg up in the cutthroat competition for thousands of visitors, hotel bookings and restaurant reservations.

The expansion here, however, has hit obstacle after obstacle. First, it was political infighting, then ill-timed inflation and, in recent months, a failure to follow through on a bold statement.

Every delay and extra dollar spent on the first half has made it harder to complete the second half, which is supposed to include a new outdoor plaza, a grand western entrance and a ballroom big enough to compete with peer cities. The overruns help explain why city officials have had to authorize $45 million more than their original pledge to get the plaza and some other improvements done.

And it’s not clear how the rest will be paid for.

Ratcliffe, president of the St. Louis Convention and Visitors Commission, wrote in a text message Friday that her comments about saving money were merely reflections of what contractors had been telling her.

“I was simply reflecting what had been shared with me,” she wrote.

Other officials defended the numbers. Rich Bradley, the president of the city’s Board of Public Service, which is managing the project, said overruns aren’t unusual on such undertakings. He said the project in question actually compares favorably to most.

“It is very typical for project overruns on design, bid, build construction projects ... to have Change Orders up to 15% of the project cost,” Bradley wrote in an email.

Critics were unswayed.

“It’s crazy,” said Bob Clark, the executive chairman of design-build firm Clayco who sees the expansion project as unambitious and doomed to disappoint. “It’s almost like, ‘You can’t make this up.’”

St. Louis County Councilman Ernie Trakas repeated his call for Ratcliffe to resign.

“When does it end?” he asked. “I have no words for the ineptitude.”

Going sideways

Talk of expansion began about a decade ago, when the Convention and Visitors Commission asked for an outside review of the America’s Center, built on the northern edge of downtown in 1977. The response, a study by Chicago firm Johnson Consulting, said the place was still an asset for the region, bringing in hundreds of thousands of people and hundreds of millions of dollars.

But the consultants said the center needed upgrades. The ballroom was too small. There wasn’t enough exhibit space. The center’s surroundings needed a refresh, too.

And if that didn’t happen, it said, St. Louis risked losing business to rival cities.

St. Louis regional leaders announced plans for a $175 million project in October 2018. They said they would add 92,000 square feet of new exhibit space along Cole Street, in the center’s northwest corner. They would build a new 65,000-square-foot ballroom along Ninth Street and a new kitchen to service it. They would replace an unsightly parking lot with a public plaza and green space and build new loading docks to accommodate bigger conventions.

Top city and county leaders agreed to split the cost, which was revised to $210 million when officials began drafting ordinances. The money would come from bonds backed by hotel tax revenue set to be freed up with the retirement of debt issued to build the Dome at America’s Center, where the Rams used to play before moving to Los Angeles.

Then, officials had to start voting, and things went sideways.

In 2019, then-Mayor Lyda Krewson and Comptroller Darlene Green spent a summer fighting over who would issue bonds for the city’s half of the bill. In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and city officials delayed floating the bonds for four months while they gauged the impact. Then, in 2021, the County Council delayed a vote on issuing its bonds until April 2022 while it wrestled over a deal for a north St. Louis County recreation center.

Still, in early October 2021, under questioning from Trakas, the critical county councilman, Ratcliffe said the entire $210 million project could still be done on budget.

“We’ve worked hard on it every single day to make the budget work and make it work for us and for our customers in terms of what we need for the facility,” she said.

In late January 2022, County Council members were again reassured by a team of city, county and convention center officials overseeing the project that it could be done on time and on budget, though the team warned additional delays could create problems.

Two months later, the city learned it had a single bid to build the first phase for $123.9 million, $40.7 million more than city procurement officials had estimated.

But city records show it was soon more than that.

‘We can’t give up’

By February 2023, officials were signing off on an extra $480,000 for plumbing, fire suppression and electrical equipment, among other things. A month later, they were approving another $800,000 in changes, some of which was needed to repair a drilled pier “damaged due to unforeseen subsurface void and rubble” and install steel components not contemplated in design documents.

In May, officials wanted different doors on some restrooms and better waterproofing in some areas, and city inspectors wanted changes to the plumbing system. In July, they OK’d adding a backflow preventer to a new water line to pass Water Division scrutiny.

Many issues, Ratcliffe said, came from underground utilities not reflected on any of the utility maps provided to the architects.

Along the way, officials also bought a decrepit parking garage stuck almost in the middle of the convention center after years of trying to convince the New York-based owners to sell and added more than $5 million in demolition costs.

Officials also added to the first phase a must-have new lobby connecting the new exhibit hall to the rest of the complex, for more than $14 million. The lobby was originally part of the second phase.

By the end of April, the contract with Ben Hur Construction Co., initially bid at roughly $123.9 million, crested $150.8 million.

The first phase is now wrapping up.

One day last week, trucks were pulling into the new loading dock area officials say will save clients time and avoid traffic snarls on Cole Street. Builders were putting the finishing touches on the new 72,000-square-foot exhibit hall that should allow the city to host three events at once. Rays of sunshine peered through the new windows not present in the old building.

Work was even starting on the second phase, despite the lack of full funding. Builders were doing utility work on what will become the new park and public plaza between Ninth and 10th streets.

Still outstanding: the new ballroom, improvements to the main Washington Avenue entrance, and a new corridor running along the west side of the building connecting the new exhibit hall, the plaza and existing space.

Board members for the Convention and Visitors Commission said that’s disappointing.

David Robert, CEO of hotelier Midas Hospitality and vice chairman of the board, said the commission will have to look at other sources of funding.

“We can’t give up on the convention center because we’ve had a setback,” he said.

Jared Boyd, Mayor Tishaura O. Jones’ chief of staff, said the office is still working on a solution. Aldermanic President Megan Green’s staff floated an additional tax on hotel visitors earlier this year, then scrapped it after learning it would violate state law.

Meanwhile, the County Council wants another word with Ratcliffe and is seeking to schedule a hearing in July.

Steph Kukuljan of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.