• By STEVEN WARD AND SANDY DAVIS
• Advocate staff writers
• Published: Oct 28, 2009 - Page: 1A

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Questions about the proposed Alive riverfront attraction and the Audubon Nature Institute dominated an informational meeting Tuesday night about the $901 million bond proposal on the Nov. 14 ballot.

But questions about the project did not keep state Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu from endorsing the bond issue earlier Tuesday.

Approximately 45 people attended the Tuesday night meeting sponsored by District 8 Metro Council member Mike Walker at the East Side Fire Department.

When some audience members asked city-parish Chief Administrative Officer Mike Futrell about an article in The Advocate indicating the Audubon Nature Institute, which would operate the Alive scientific and education facility, had lost money recently, Futrell responded by calling the article “a hatchet job.”

Futrell said the article was one of the worst pieces of reporting he had ever seen because significant information about the Audubon Nature Institute’s finances was missing. Futrell said that information includes the profits the Audubon Institute made in 2006 and 2007 and the fact that institute missed its 2008 budget projection by less than one-half of 1 percent.

Earlier Tuesday, Landrieu announced his endorsement of the bond proposal and called Mayor-President Kip Holden a “visionary.”

Landrieu said every city in the U.S. that has “leaped forward” in competing on a national and worldwide level for tourism in recent years has first made infrastructure improvements.

“It’s never easy to do and it does require an investment,” Landrieu said. “We have to take risks, work hard and put ourselves on the line … .”

At Tuesday night’s meeting, Holden said national and international businesses and developers are watching Baton Rouge to see if voters pass the bond issue.

“This is worth the risk,” the mayor said. “Businesses and developers want to come here because of what we are doing.”

If approved Nov. 14, the new half-cent sales tax and the 9.9-mill property tax increase would fund major drainage improvements, a new public safety complex and parish prison, traffic light synchronizations, riverfront developments and other projects.

The part of the bond issue that has come under the most criticism, in general and Tuesday night, is the $366.3 million riverfront development — including the $225 million Alive project.

Alive, with a focus on Louisiana environments, would feature an aquarium, outdoor amphitheater and scientific research facilities.