The planning and presentation is done. Now it’s time to get to work.

Monday night’s presentation by The Sports Force, the Canton, Ga.-based consulting firm hired by the city to perform a feasibility study on a sports complex at the city’s Fisher Ferry property shows it can be done, but there’s still a long way between an artist’s conception and a lot of statistics on economic impact and having the first shovel full of dirt being turned. And it all hinges on whether the city fathers can convince residents that it will work and then convince enough voters to pass a special sales tax to fund the project on June 6 when the referendum on the tax will be on the municipal general election ballot.

The Board of Mayor and Aldermen want to levy a 1 percent sales tax on hotel rooms and food and beverage sales estimated to bring in $1 million a year. The tax has a repealer, meaning once the project is paid for, the tax goes off the books. And that tax is the key to the project. If the voters don’t approve it, plans for the sports complex go back into limbo, where it was until former Mayor Paul Winfield brought it to life in 2012 and the present administration kept it alive.

That’s what makes how city officials present their plan for the sports complex so important. There is still a group of skeptics in the community who believe the Fisher Ferry property is the wrong site because it is isolated and difficult to reach because of traffic on Halls Ferry Road, the main access to the property. We were one of those skeptics, but after The Sports Force presentation, we’ve become believers this can happen. There are some others, however, who still need to see the entire program.

Mayor George Flaggs Jr. has always said he wants transparency. In this case, the board’s presentation will have to be as clear as air. The board will have to answer all questions about the proposed sports complex truthfully and accurately.

The sports complex is not yet a reality. How the mayor and aldermen present the plan and the sales tax to fund it to the public at large will determine whether the sports complex soon becomes reality.