Let�s just say that Bass Pro creates every single one of those 400 jobs and all of those jobs are full-time jobs (something almost unheard of in the majority of the low wage retail universe). Let�s also say that those jobs pay the national average, full time retail job salary of $23,647 or approximately $11.37 per hour. Using these assumptions after seven years of operation, the government�s sixty million dollars will have been cycled into the hands of the low income workers that a retail establishment employs.

However, this does not mean that the government will have recouped its costs in terms of taxes. Lately, the propaganda effort of The Buffalo News on behalf of the New(t) Republican �tax revolt� has driven home the message that New Yorkers are taxed at a rate of over thirty percent on average. In reality, a person who makes in the neighborhood of what our 400 hypothetical Bass Pro workers makes, will not pay that much but let�s just say for sake of argument that they pay $7,094 in annual taxes. At this rate it will take government only a little more than twenty three years for government to recoup its investment in actual tax receipts in the bank.

Of course, skeptics will point out that twenty-three years is an eternity for a retail outlet to stay in business at one location. They might also add that the calculation of twenty-three years doesn�t take into account, inflation, or the loss of return on investment this capital would have drawn if it was merely invested, but then these are the naysayers.

What is Outdoor World? �Outdoor World shall mean a first class signature Bass Pro Outdoor World Store that may include the retail space, restaurant and lodging, to be constructed in the Memorial Auditorium.�

Terms of the �project� are considerably more vague: �Project shall mean the entire Waterfront development including, but not limited to, a Bass Pro retail store, restaurant, hotel and all other components of the lease on the Memorial Auditorium, the parking facility, the Intermodal Transportation Center and the Webster Block, Erie Canal/Great Lakes Museum.�

The Intermodal Transportation Center refers to the loophole that will give the project access to federal funding. By moving the Amtrak station into the Aud, the project will be eligble for federal funds, despite the fact that there is currently no demand for a new downtown train station. Originally $100 million dollars were to be made available to the project but Mayor Masiello delayed the project until Bass Pro could be brought in. This cost the City almost seventy million dollars in development money, or about enough for a second project of the same scope.

Way to go, Tony!

But does the Bass Pro project include the right to sublet to Casino Buffalo? Well, the Seneca Nation of Indians was granted a six month extension to open a Casino in Buffalo, and one source told us that Bass Pro has held discussions with the Seneca Tribal Council in the past.

If you think about all of the parking, the relative isolation of the Aud from other businesses, the fact that Bass Pro has already successfully taken part in a casino/superstore project in Las Vegas, and the fact that government is picking up the tab, the whole thing is starts to look like the kind of sweetheart deal that would warm the cockles of Al D�Amato�s heart.

True, we haven�t examined is the amount of money that will be put into the construction job market, but if a casino becomes part of the deal By John McMahon

Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World, LLC has finally made a deal with the anti-Democratic powers that dominate our local government, a deal so fragile and special that it was kept from public oversight lest the magic contained in the Memorandum of Understanding between the parties vanish in a cloud of fairy dust. The Mayor refused to allow Buffalo Common Council members to see it, in order to avoid a public discussion of the project.

Eventually the MOU found its way outside the tight knit circle of usual suspects and their sycophants.

An alphabet soup of governmental agencies, �collectively proposed a development package to induce Bass pro (including its affiliated business entities) to develop a Bass pro outdoor World Store in Buffalo and for the ESDC to establish a museum/interpretive center dedicated to the Erie Canal and Great Lakes Heritage��

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