Layton won't pay for center

LAYTON — The Layton City Council has decided to not contribute $1 million that Davis County leaders had asked for to help with a $13.2 million expansion of the Davis Conference Center.

Instead, the city will contribute roughly $225,000 in infrastructure and through waivers of building and impact fees.

City manager Alex Jensen said the city had already planned a $50,000 sidewalk project for a nearby area, but will instead build the sidewalk for the conference-center expansion. The waived fees are estimated to make up the rest of the $225,000, Jensen said, but the amount of the fees depends on actual costs, which the county doesn't yet have.

The conference center expansion is slated to have 25,000 square feet of exhibition space.

"The city wanted to be supportive," Jensen said, but because the expansion is a county project, the county should bear the brunt of the financing.

County leaders expect to issue sales-tax revenue bonds to finance the expansion. They plan to pay back the bonds using an increase in a hotel-room tax.

A feasibility study completed earlier this year showed the county could attract more conventions to the Davis Conference Center if it had more exhibition space. The conference center has been operating near capacity since it opened in 2004.

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E-mail: jdougherty@desnews.com