Ren Square officials are three to four months away from deciding whether to build the project, and still, after all these years, several big questions haven't been answered.

The biggest, of course, is how we'll pay for the complex. It'll cost $83 million to build the theater portion, and we're still $55 million short. In addition, consultants say the theater will run an operating deficit of over a million dollars a year.

Nearly all of the construction cost - perhaps all but $10 million - will be paid for with public money: federal, state, county. Ren Square officials are pitching that as a good investment in economic development. But the experience of other cities is mixed: some projects like this do pay off, in revenue generated by the theater and in new development nearby. Some don't.

What makes the difference? Whether the theater results in a substantial number of new performances in the region. It's not enough to simply move events from one venue to another.

The primary tenant of Ren Square will be the Rochester Broadway Theatre League, which now stages events at the Auditorium Theatre. Consultants project that the Ren Square theater will host about 30 more events a year than the Aud. But for the Rochester area, how many of those events are really additions?

For example: A consultants' report released last month suggested that a variety of local non-profit performance groups might use the Ren Square theater, including Rochester City Ballet and "opera." But the expanded Nazareth Arts Center will be home for RCB. And while Mercury Opera might decide to move its big performances from the Eastman Theatre to Ren Square, we can't count those events as "new" when we're looking for a regional return on millions of dollars of public investment.

Earlier this week, I asked Ren Square spokesperson Mike Power whether the consultants had fleshed out the number of truly new performances that the Ren Square theater would generate. He said they have not. Have they estimated the number of performances that would be left at the Auditorium Theatre once RBTL moves out? No.

We'd better not be spending all this money just to move chairs around. And keep this in mind: In this economy, every dollar spent on Ren Square is a dollar that might have gone to another, equally important organization: charitable donations, capital campaigns, endowments, ticket sales.

If we're going to build the theater, we need to know what we'll get for our investment. And who will suffer from the diversion of funds.

So far, I haven't seen clear answers. Maybe Ren Square board members will push for them when they meet next week.

Other unanswered questions: Critics continue to ask for information about traffic congestion and other problems associated with the bus station. We may get some answers in a few weeks. Spokesperson Mike Power says Ren Square officials may hold a public hearing on the environmental assessment in November.

And: It's assumed that the Rochester Broadway Theater League will operate the theater, but the Ren Square board hasn't decided who will own it. Among the possibilities, says Power: Monroe Community College, SUNY, the county, or "an authority of some kind."

The issue of ownership "is not a topic that has attracted a great deal of focus," Power said, given issues like funding. Granted. But just for the record: with authorities, the public gets less oversight.

Cheney with lipstick: I've been absolutely flabbergasted at the number of seemingly intelligent journalists who thought Sarah Palin did well in her debate against Joe Biden last week. "Did well" if you thought it was theater, I guess. Palin's understanding of issues is as thin as the cards that served as her CliffsNotes. Worse: she (or her script writers) think Dick Cheney has given us a model of what the vice presidency should be. Appalling? You betcha.