Tax collections fall short for Colts stadium

INDIANAPOLIS -- The first checks from restaurant tax collections in suburban Indianapolis counties to help pay for the new Colts stadium were smaller than expected.\nState finance officials are counting on about $300,000 a month from the new 1 percent food-and-beverage tax in six suburban counties for the project, but the distribution of money from August restaurant visits netted a little more than half of that amount.\nOfficials were not immediately worried that the estimated $3.5 million a year from the tax in Boone, Hamilton, Hancock, Hendricks, Johnson and Shelby counties would continue to fall short.\nDepartment of Revenue Commissioner John Eckart said his agency was identifying businesses in those counties that might not be paying their new taxes and would notify them of the matter.\nSome of the taxes could have been paid right before the monthly deadline, and Eckart said he expected collections to be on track once a second month's worth of revenues were received.\nRevenue from a variety of tax increases in Marion County for the stadium project came in closer to projections, amounting to about $3.3 million for the first two months.\nConstruction work on the 63,000-seat retractable-roof stadium has started, with the $500 million project set for completion by the start of the 2008 football season.\nAnd once the stadium is built, the Indiana Convention Center will be expanded onto the current site of the RCA Dome. That project is slated to be finished by 2010 at a cost of more than $400 million.