For anyone who wants to see the actual celebration in question, here's the video linked straight to the moment of the "ball drop."

That celebration was privately funded to the tune of $12.5M according to The Post. That's about $26M today. I guess it's doable. The question is would a lot of people show up year after year. I think the fact that it was Y2K was the only reason it had such a large turnout of celebrities and spectators.