Field of Schemes
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Latest Rays stadium plan includes “waterfall” fund that could drive public cost past $2B
The revised Tampa Bay Rays stadium plan paperwork was released on Friday afternoon, in a classic Friday news dump. The idea behind these is to dominate the discourse just as everyone goes home for the weekend, so that by the time Monday rolls around — in this case, with a city council vote looming on Thursday […]
Friday roundup: KC approves $1B+ in Royals stadium subsidies over calls for public vote, independent analysis
First things first: The Kansas City council voted on a proposed city funding package for a new Royals stadium yesterday, and as expected, it sailed through, with councilmembers voting 11-2 to approve a series of agreements promising $600 million in cash plus at least $500 million in tax breaks toward a new $1.9 billion stadium at […]
KC committee approves city $1B+ Royals stadium subsidy after security arrests opposition speaker
The $1.5 billion–plus Kansas City Royals stadium subsidy plan sailed through its first city council committee hearing yesterday, with the Finance, Governance and Public Safety Committee voting unanimously to approve $600 million in city funding plus hundreds of millions more in tax breaks. The vote sent Mayor Quinton Lucas into paroxysms of metaphor, declaring that […]
KC council set to vote on city giving Royals owner $600m plus a crapton of tax breaks, getting almost nothing in return
A Kansas City council committee is set to vote today on approving city money toward a new Royals stadium, so naturally the actual legislation didn’t get released until yesterday, providing everyone involved approximately no time to read and understand it. While everyone scrambles to play catchup, here’s an attempt to at least figure out the main […]
San Antonio council votes not to let city residents vote on $489m in Spurs arena funding
The San Antonio city council has completed its hearing on Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones’ proposal to put a measure on the November ballot on whether to devote $489 million in city money to a new Spurs arena, and their verdict is nope: The San Antonio City Council batted down Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones’ attempt to […]
Friday roundup: Plano residents to vote on $700m Stars arena subsidy, Bears still playing hard to get with IL and IN
In case you missed it, sports economist/meme master J.C. Bradbury has a new book on sports subsidy deals due out soon: This One Will Be Different details the latest in stadium and arena deals and why they never pay off for the public, with a particular focus on the Atlanta Braves‘ extraction of money from Cobb […]
Free Money [subscribers-only]
The standard stadium playbook was laid out by Joanna Cagan and myself back in Chapter 4 of Field of Schemes, “The Art of the Steal,” and hasn’t changed much since. The move threats, promises of illusory fiscal windfalls, warnings of obsolescence (whether physical or economic) and so on have… To keep reading this Field of […]
Portland okays spending $120m on Blazers arena renovation if Dundon agrees to pay rent and PILOTs
After months of public debate, the Portland city council voted 8-4 yesterday to approve spending $120 million toward renovations to the Trail Blazers arena, plus $275 million for upgrades over the next 20 years. But the term sheet it approved included several major new conditions — most prominently, that the team start paying rent, starting […]
Councilmember says his Rays stadium tax plan would leave Tampa “not involved in the financing,” except for all the financing
Ever since Tampa councilmember Bill Carlson announced a few days ago that he’d be willing to consider casting a swing vote for a Tampa Bay Rays stadium if the city’s share came out of a different pot of property tax money, I’ve been engaged in a weird, slow-motion discussion with Carlson on the former Twitter […]
Portland may ask Blazers owner to pay rent in exchange for $395m in city arena funding
The Portland city council is set to vote on a term sheet today for the proposed $600 million Trail Blazers arena renovations deal, and it may not look like the one that was initially proposed. Late yesterday, four councilmembers issued a proposed amendment with revised terms that include team owner Tom Dundon paying $2 million […]
KC mayor postpones Royals stadium funding vote after failing to tell council what they’d be voting on
A Kansas City council committee was all set yesterday to consider allocating $20 million to a Royals stadium fund for something unspecified, when Mayor Quinton Lucas abruptly pulled it from the meeting agenda because democracy: “I believe that even in representative democracy, i.e. going through city council meetings, you have a fair opportunity not just […]
New taxpayer-funded Bills stadium features record number of state-of-the-art obstructed-view seats
Buffalo Bills ownership held an open practice on Sunday to show off their new $2.1 billion stadium (public cost: $1 billion and change), and it did not go well: Other Bills fans pointed out that many of the new stadium’s seats are not obstructed, but that didn’t do much to quell the online furor, especially after […]
Multnomah county chair hires Blazers negotiator who heads pro-arena lobbying group, sees no conflict of interest
Uproar continues to grow over Multnomah County hiring a negotiator in the Portland Trail Blazers arena renovation fight who has a curious resume: Chair Jessica Vega Pederson disclosed Thursday that she had tapped former Trail Blazers executive Chris Oxley to represent the county as it worked with Portland officials on a framework aimed at keeping […]
Tampa swing vote says he’ll okay Rays stadium if city spends from different pot of tax money
I’m on the road today, but did want to briefly note that Tampa councilmember Bill Carlson, the likely swing vote on any Tampa Bay Rays stadium deal, has come out with his plan for a new way of funding the team’s $2 billion stadium district subsidy demand: Tampa City Councilman Bill Carlson has proposed a new […]
Friday roundup: County commission approves $100m in Blazers arena money, doesn’t actually have $100m
One of several remaining shoes dropped in the Portland Trail Blazers arena renovation saga yesterday, as Multnomah County commissioners voted 4-1 to approve team owner Tom Dundon’s term sheet for $100 million in county funding for the project. Or maybe just half a shoe, as three of the five commissioners voted not to use $35 million […]
Arenas that have lost NBA or NHL teams turn out to have done just fine
For anyone who holds to the belief that sports fans are mindless boosters who want their elected officials to keep their beloved team owners (or just beloved team’s owners) happy no matter what the cost, I present you with Blazer’s Edge, the SB Nation fan site for the Portland Trail Blazers. Site editor Dave Deckard yesterday […]
Does Tom Dundon really want to move the Trail Blazers, or he just creating leverage?
One of the persistent themes in the ever-non-evolving Portland Trail Blazers arena saga has been the question of what new team owner Tom Dundon really wants. Oh, he’s made clear enough what he’s asking for: $600 million in taxpayer money to spend on upgrading his 31-year-old arena, in exchange for which he’ll keep paying (some) taxes. […]
Broncos execs tired of waiting for someone to give them land and money for stadium
It’s been almost a year since Denver Broncos owners Greg and Carrie Penner, Mayor Mike Johnston, and Gov. Jared Polis announced plans for a new stadium to be built by 2031 at Denver’s state-owned Burnham Yard railyards, with the big remaining questions being how much the Penners would pay for the land, how they would get it […]
Friday roundup: Blazers arena staredown escalates, haggling continues in Rays stadium standoff
Happy Friday! There’s nothing in the latest batch of stadium and arena news that can quite compete with the European and North/Central American soccer federations vowing to start boycotting FIFA events as soon as this September if FIFA sells operating rights to the World Cup to Jared Kushner’s brother, but it was still a pretty […]
Where will Tom Dundon move the Trail Blazers? Probably nowhere
The Portland Trail Blazers arena dispute so far in a nutshell: Tom Dundon, owner of the Carolina Hurricanes and past purveyor of predatory lending car loans, bought the Blazers from the estate of the late Paul Allen for $4.25 billion. With four years to go on a short-term lease with the city for the arena that Allen […]
County commissioners propose giving Blazers owner $35m from different taxpayer pocket
The two Multnomah County commissioners who are trying to call a do-over on the county’s proposed $100 million or so in spending toward $600 million in Portland Trail Blazers renovations have revealed more details of their plan, and it’s looking less like pulling $35 million from the pot than taking it from a different pocket: […]
Hearing to get public feedback on Royals stadium shut down early after public gives too much feedback
Representatives of the Kansas City Royals and the Crown Center Redevelopment Corporation held a required public hearing on their rezoning proposals for a new Royals stadium complex yesterday, and and they absolutely heard from the public: “We already said no to a downtown baseball stadium, and here it comes back again,” said Mary Ellen Vincent, a […]
Tampa council swing vote opens talks with Rays about his price for approving stadium deal
Anytime you have a one-vote margin on a stadium deal, as currently exists on the Tampa city council, you can expect to see team officials see what it’ll take the peel off a swing vote to get themselves a majority. And we’re starting to see what that haggling is going to look like for the Tampa […]
Friday roundup: Tampa council slams brakes on Rays stadium approvals, A’s find an investor (maybe sorta)
Lots of other news this week while we were off on Portland Trail Blazers watch: The Tampa city council has made two moves to throw the brakes on Tampa Bay Rays owner Patrick Zalupski’s proposed $2 billion stadium subsidy, voting 4-3 to not send a land-use amendment to the state for approval, while also removing […]
Can Tom Dundon move the Blazers or not? Let’s read his lease and find out!
I didn’t mean for this to be an all–Portland Trail Blazers week, but here we are. The latest news is that, on top of anonymous team officials saying they won’t dignify the city’s lease offer with a response, anonymous city officials say they’ll wait for a counteroffer because to do otherwise would be “negotiating against […]
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