Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance is lamenting that the president’s recent trip to Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson saddled the city with an extra $200,000 in policing expenses. The Anchorage Daily News dutifully picked up the mayor’s complaint, amplifying the cost angle while leaving out an important part of the equation: The economic benefit.
More than 800 journalists and thousands of diplomats poured into Anchorage for the summit between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, filling hotels, restaurants, and rental cars. That sudden demand represents a major shot in the arm for Anchorage’s hospitality and retail economy.
The city’s 12% bed tax alone meant significant tax revenue pouring into city coffers, likely far more than the $200,000 in police overtime. Add to that alcohol taxes, restaurant sales, rideshare fares, taxi runs, and gift store purchases, and the net effect was overwhelmingly positive, although no entity, such as the Anchorage Economic Development Corporation, has revealed an actual analysis of that economic benefit.
But while no official economic-impact report has been published for Anchorage’s summit, comparable events in other cities show clear short-term boosts in the hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars. Hotel and bed-and-breakfast rooms were going for several hundred dollars a night.
For local hotels, restaurants, and transportation providers, the days surrounding the president’s visit were a bonanza. Long-term benefits are even harder to measure but just as real: Global media exposure, heightened international visibility, and an elevated profile for Anchorage as a venue for future events, investment, and tourism.
It’s also worth noting where the city chooses to put its money. Anchorage was willing to spend $200,000 on team-building exercises for the Anchorage Water and Wastewater Utility earlier this year, yet it hasn’t invested in cleaning up the downtown homeless wasteland that businesses and visitors face every day. No effort was made to reduce the presence of vagrancy during the summit between Trump and Putin.
Now, City Hall is complaining about the cost of providing a safe environment for the president of the United States — a duty most Alaskans would consider a basic responsibility. Add to that, the city’s annual budget is now a record-setting $639 million. The $200,000 in police overtime represents approximately 0.0313% of that budget.
In other words, while the mayor and her allies in the media paint the summit as a financial burden, the reality is that Anchorage likely came out well ahead. The city gained international attention, collected a surge of tax revenue, and gave its business community a welcome lift at the tail end of summer.
As for the extra money for policing, that money will be recycled right back into the economy of the city.
“The municipality will request reimbursement from the federal government,” the mayor’s spokeswoman (freshly recruited from the Anchorage Daily News) told Newsweek in an email. “We don’t expect to have final numbers from all departments for a few weeks. However, it’s safe to say the municipality’s expenses related to the summit were in excess of $200,000.”
Once again, the mainstream media bit on the Democrat talking points to sideswipe Trump’s effort to forge a peace agreement, as City Hall chooses to focus on government costs while ignoring private-sector benefits, telling the public only half the story.
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Wow. What a disappointment Anchorage has become.
We need that money for the bums!!! ACEH, Mash etc are waiting on their check.
& let us not forget Miss Lafrance’s one-quarter day off to all municipal employees…
Isn’t she planning another damn parade?!?! How much do those cost to block off roads,provide police,clean up,etc. ?
Let me guess if Joe Biden had the peace summit it would be the greatest thing that ever happened to Alaska, Nobel peace prize for him right?
These democrats are unbearable.
Democrat logic,
In the democrat’s heads this makes sense. what makes sense in their heads and spoken out loud makes no sense at all
Thank you so much for putting the facts out there so elegantly. Thank God we have you Ms. Dowling, the only voice on the right in Alaska setting the record straight. The Mayor’s behavior and her office is downright shameful and makes us all look bad.
“……..The city’s 12% bed tax alone meant significant tax revenue pouring into city coffers, likely far more than the $200,000 in police overtime………”
It would require $1,666,666 in hotel receipts for the tax collectors to get $200,000 out of a 12% bed tax. If the outrageous prices Anchorage hotels charge average $500 per night per room, that would require 3,333 rooms to be rented………from an already booked up Anchorage hotel industry in mid-summer.
That’s a pretty tall order.
However, yes, the outrageous alcohol taxes probably accrued many thousands of dollars from drunken Russians on tour to their former homeland, anxious to down a few bottles each of foreign vodka while here overnight, so the Brown Jug probably enjoyed a coup.
Hopefully the APD overtime resulted in Cook Inlet Pre-Trial getting filled up for a night or two. That in itself is a sound investment.
There was however a downside.
The absence of Hunter Biden meant a sharp decline in revenue for the opiate/meth/crack slingers and sexworker industry since January 20.
Don’t get out much in the summer do you Reg. You could not find a hotel room available in Anchorage and all were more than $500/ night. I attempted a single night at the Sheraton and was told IF a room was available, it would have been $1,000/night and the nearest hotel with available rooms was in Girdwood where the ask was $700/night. I recommend doing some homework before blathering your glass half full opinions.
It’s true, Charles; I don’t get out much in summer except in tents………and certainly not in Anchorage, where tents have become the new suburbia. Even at a basement-bargain price of $500 per night, I’m not much interested……..and especially not in Anchorage. Heck, I rarely have to go there anymore since pretty much everything I need is out here in the Valley now. But you confirmed my contention: there vacancy rate is pretty much zero…………which makes one wonder where all these journalists and Russians were staying. But I bet the Russians (as reported) did pay the $12.80 per gallon state tax on vodka (plus 5% to Anchorage) for their bedtime bottles……….would you like to confirm or deny for us?
It would take 800 visitors, each paying $1000/night for 2 nights, to get 200K in taxes.
That didn’t happen. There were not enough hotel rooms (hardly any as you point out) people shared rooms, people stayed on base, people stayed in AirB&B (is that taxed?) people stayed at the AK Airlines center …. etc.
Perhaps, with the hotel, booze & car rental taxes we got our 200K back, but I doubt it.
It was only 2 days & these journalists are not exactly wealthy people.
Trump Derangement Syndrome in action!
Cut DEI funding and viola, extra useable cash! So easy even a Democrat can do it.
Weak leaders complain. Strong leaders adapt and take responsibility.
at least subtract the direct tax benefit which should be more than 200000. and the indirect tax benefit from taxes on increased economic activity…hmm sounds like the city owes the federal govt.
What seems to be overlooked is Trump’s majestic performance in Anchorage with his ending of the Russia-Ukrainian war. It may not happened the first day of his tenure like he promised but some things are difficult. Add on his magical powers in getting grocery prices down 50% since he took office and you can see how the leftists are so dejected. $2 gasoline and $3 ground beef, happy days are here again!
Look in the bright side, Seb
There are no longer drug addicts and sexual deviants working in the White House and the Press Secretary is not illiterate
Just dont get your panties in a bunch its never going to be that good again but it would be much worse if it was Harris
LaFrance hands out cash like an ATM, 200,000 a drop in the bucket. I assuming Trump will tell LF and Constant to pound ——— sand!!
Just one more Democrat ‘Nothing Burger’.
What did it cost the MOA when Obama came up here to have dinner at Rogoff’s mansion?
Yep and not a word about from our Commie Press.
I’m just surprised that our ‘leftest leadership’ here in Anchorage wasn’t out burning Trump in effigy to protest his ‘fascist’ and ‘dictatorial’ efforts to promote peace?
She s so INCOMPETENT!!
You have probably noticed that Suzanne LaFrance does not publish her email address. Neither does her Chief of Staff. Also too … LaFrance refuses to allow appointments with the Anchorage constituency and rarely speaks without a prepared script and talking points.
How did this woman get elected???
She is a moveable sheep, they just herd her around.
Did she authorize 200K in OT to have cops “on standby” but not actually working?
That’s what I want to know.
Our Lefties created this “Headline” so they have an excuse for not getting anything done.
We would, but all our funds went to Trump & Putin and now Trump won’t pay us back!
(Democrats First Commandment …. Always blame Trump for everything)
Let me ask this question. The President and his staff on Airforce one never left the base. Yet protesters vandalized one of gates on Jber which Airforce security detained and APD was then contacted to pick up the civilians. How does the Mayor get off claiming Three APD cops cost 200K
Can an audit be requested. I got a little inside the base Info, APD was not providing security for the President.
Maybe the Mayor is just got her nickers in a bunch because she was not invited.
What a petty complaint, so infantile. Embarrassing. Do something constructive like fixing your city, its become a dump.
Well good people came alive for this article. She is not a democrat she is a Marxist as is her entire Birkenstock hippy bead family. Let’s see how much outside money was brought into anchorage for that meeting?? O ya but that doesn’t matter to that butt head.
The mayor must be a friend of Lisa Murkowski
Two hundred thousand is only a drop in the bucket when you compare it to what is spent on the homeless in Anchorage.
Never underestimate the power of stupid.
Los Anchorage, New Portlandia, Trans-Seattle take your pick of nicknames for Anchorage. Millions of dollars spent on contractors with political connections to provide free hotel rooms, free food, soon to be built free tiny sheds (homes) for homeless to sleep in. Also, let’s not forget the municipality’s free camping areas (city parks/snow dumps/recreation areas/trails) wherever you care to pitch a tent hasn’t solved the homeless population numbers. What a cesspool of homelessness and despair Anchorage has become.
Mayor LaFrance is just mad that she wasn’t invited and asked to bring about world peace. She is also in need of keeping her base riled up and donating….
It would be helpful if the mayor posted the agreement they supposedly have with the Feds to substantiate her claim. Our good mayor also seems to have unreasonable expectation. The summit was August 15. It has not even been a month and she thinks that the federal bureaucratic behemoth moves that fast? Most times you won’t see any action for at least 30 days or more……and she knows that!
It makes me wonder if she and Chris just authorized that money. It would be nice if we knew what they actually spent it on….Mr. Constant’s protestation that this money could have been used for removal of homeless camps, is preposterous considering they did nothing to show Anchorage in any good light.
If it was Brandon in town for a meeting like that one they would have spent a million bucks keeping Sleepy Joe from getting lost looking for ice cream stores in downtown Anchorage.
What, exactly, did APD do during this visit? They weren’t on base, where President Trump was. They weren’t preventing some asshat from defacing the sign at the base gate. They weren’t even buying and delivering donuts to the summit meeting. So where was this $200K actually spent?
Methinks the lady doth protest too much.
We all know that she wasn’t elected for her intellect. She’s mentally malleable and a useful tool to the Assembly majority. Voting matters and, apparently, our bunch hasn’t figured that out yet.
What you get when you vote a democrat in and a democrat assembly.
Not to mention the free publicity from the news programs showing the surrounding countryside during their reports. You can t get that kind of media nearly as inexpensively, and they didn’t go into town to show,the less than desirable images of grubby homeless camps
Tom MacDonald and his new hit totally applies. Please, check it out. ‘https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKdFeZTnAK0&list=RDwKdFeZTnAK0&start_radio=1
[…] The communist/globalist crime syndicate Mayor Suzanne LaFrance complained about the added cost to the Anchorage Daily News, while she ignored the enormous economic benefit the summit brought to the city. Wisely, Must Read Alaska‘s Suzanne Downing set the record straight: […]
I know Elmendorf AFB from having served there. I’m quite confident that with adjoining Fort Richardson army post (now joint-base), the U.S. military provided Trump with impeccable security for his and Putin’s on-base meeting. At no cost to adjacent Anchorage. It’s the mayor’s call — not Trump’s or the USA’s call — to provide *Anchorage’s* increased visitors with security. That’s her job 24/7/365, whether or not the military base has high-level visitors.
$200,000
.
Really? For a mayor who can somehow locate millions of dollars to help the homeless (which contribute nothing to the economy), somehow this is an overwhelming horrible expense.
.
Actually, let me correct myself. The homeless do not just contribute nothing, they actually harm business in the city.
Suzannes argument is totally beside the point. When celebrities pull into town, they should pay their way. But not Trump! He has a long history of stiffing every town/city in which he appears. After all, he doesn’t need to respond to the little people. This has been his MO all his life.
Comrad TomSE1,
Trump was at JBER, the military covered his protection, etc. and all the imaginary expenses our destructive Marxist Mayor Lafrance’s imaginary expenses, are just that, imaginary. Wait, they are as imaginative as your perceived class warfare, its the rich versus the poor, go back to your upper class marxist neighborhood home and invite all the homeless phony camp people to set up on your front lawn and back yard. That should be your MO if you were even remotely honest and true to your ignorant ethos.
Done for now.
Mayor LaFrance clearly has difficulty with Math and Evaluating the need to spend money. Solid Math skills should be a requirement of the City’s highest position. Grace should be 2nd…. Sadly, she is not demonstrating either in this instance.
No one complained when Obama came to town….No matter what your political persuasion we all thought it was pretty cool…OH that is right…there was a Republican Mayor that understood having the President in town is positive and a big deal.
Please stop whining Mayor LaFrance, it is not becoming.