El Paso City Looking at Sun Metro Property for Downtown Arena

It’s been so long since El Paso voters approved a plan for a downtown arena, one would think they’ve changed their mind.

It has been 11 YEARS since a downtown arena was approved as part of a quality of life bond in 2012.  In that time, the downtown ballpark (approved by the same bond) has been built, and the team has won a league championship and just celebrated its tenth season.

A location for the ARENA, though, has not even been chosen yet.

We all THOUGHT it was going to be in the downtown area just south of the Abraham Chavez Theater and Convention Center known as “Duranguito”.

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Following years of protest and millions of dollars in court fees, that area is off the table. After all that time and money, the city still hasn’t picked a site for the arena.

Now, according to reporting from El Paso Matters the city is assessing “a downtown Sun Metro property” as the possible home for the arena.

The special Bond Overview Advisory Committee (something that’s surely adding MORE cost to the phantom project) is reportedly doing environmental impact assessments on the site to see if it would be feasible.

The site was suggested by a San Francisco architectural firm the city hired to come up with suggestions.

The City paid $25,000 for that study. 25K just to tell them, “Eh, maybe put it where the bus station is”.

That might explain why we’ve already blown through about 30 million of the $180 million that was budgeted for the arena. Yes, we’re already out 30 million and we haven’t even chosen a site.

At this point, how many taxpayers just want their money back?