Sports Mailbag, Tampa Tribune, Sunday (Sports Section, p. 16, cols 1 &2)

[USFMikeB]

Dr. Porter's study is flawed.  He basically concluded the money that comes in would have been spent anyway, and the increased costs to the local government for services is never taken into account when reviewing the economic impact.

To be sure, there may be an opportunity cost of some tourists who would come to Tampa, but couldn't get hotels that weekend because of the event - or the cost of local government services.  These "opportunity costs" are how he shows the economic impact is less than projected.

Actually the study isn't flawed from that standpoint.  Dr. Porter stated that the super bowl fans are just displacing other tourists so that is a wash and the economic impact is not LOCAL.

He found that the only people who felt an impact from the Super Bowl were the national hotel chains because they will be able to increase their room charge but that money is not kept local.

However, he will tell you as he has me, that there are intangibles to hosting the super bowl that are not completely recognizable by an economic impact study, goodwill, advertising etc.

He was brought in to counter-argue the economic impact study put forth by others.

Most (if not all) "national hotel chains" are franchises not corporate owned and operated.  So the impact, and much of the money, stays local in the community.  The same is true for restaurants.  That is part of the flaw in his argument. 

Sure the national chains get some benefit, the same as they would no matter where the Super Bowl is held... but a significant portion is retained locally.

The reality is probably somewhere in between the differing studies, as one is looking at the rosiest possibilities and the other is looking for any costs possible.  However, one thing is certain, those studies that say that an area will reap hundreds of millions from a game are hogwash.