La Crosse Center Expansion Could Bring More Visitors, Future Shortage Of Hotel Space

A proposed expansion of La Crosse’s convention center could bring up to 48,600 more stays in the city’s hotels.

The La Crosse Center Board is still considering three different options for the expansion.

But a new economic impact study found all of the proposed designs would bring more visitors to La Crosse and the city’s hotels.

“You can see the proportionality as we get more square footage (in the design), the income for the center increases and more room nights for downtown La Crosse, which also translates to more jobs,” said Brent Smith, president of the La Crosse Center Board.

The project designs range in cost from $42 million to $55 million and could bring 8 to 11 percent more visitors annually.

But the report also found the availability of hotels could limit the economic impact of the center in the future.

Smith said this finding was surprising given the 450 new hotel rooms added in the last two years.

“It certainly seems like we’ve had a burst of activity,” Smith said. “I just think we have to play it out for awhile. It’s not something that I think anybody, given the increase, would do right away.”

Board member Jessica Olson said she also doesn’t see it as an issue for the short term.

“I see that as maybe being a potential barrier 20 years from now from the center being able to be at the maximum capacity of its possible function in terms of the number of events or trade shows or conventions it can handle in a year. But these things happen slow,” said Olson, who is also a member of the La Crosse City Council.

Olson said it will take several years after the renovation for the La Crosse Center to start fully booking the new space.

“A lot of the bigger functions book their events three or four years out,” said Olson. “It’s a long-term process and I wouldn’t read too much into (the report) because that won’t really come into play until after we really get through the first year of momentum into this.”

The budget for the project is currently at $42 million, with $5 million coming from state funding in this year’s biennial budget.

Two of the designs being considered would surpass that budget, so Olson said the board will need to go back to the city council for approval.

“There is such a thing as spending too much money and there’s also such a thing as not spending enough and we have to find the median point,” Olson said.

Smith said he hopes to select a final design for the expansion early next year and begin construction by the fall 2018.