The Examiner has an article on 2002 retail sales numbers in Missouri. No surprise that Independence and Lee's Summit are big winners. What is surprising is that KCMO had a 5% decline in retail sales. Even after all of the huge subsidies we have handed out for strip malls in the Northland, we are still losing retail sales like crazy.
Are our tax incentive programs really so broken? Indep. also handed out huge TIF subsidies in the mid/late 1990s, yet even during a recession they seem to have stimulated enough new activity to cover the TIFs and make a profit. Even our struggling areas like Bannister, Blue Ridge, Ward Parkway, etc. seem to have turned around or at least bottomed out, yet the Northland and Plaza growth still wasn't enough to compensate.
2002 MO Retail Sales
http://www.examiner.net/stories/040703/ ... 3007.shtml
KC: -5.2%
Blue Springs 1.8%
Indep: 2.89%
STL: 3.79%
St. Charles: 10.93% (STL)
Lee's Summit: 24.95%