D-Backs owners sue to break lease, so they can escape being shackled to 19-year-old stadium

The owners of the Arizona Diamondbacks have started off 2017 with a bang as well, moving forward with until-now-idle threats by filing suit to break their lease with Maricopa County on Chase Field, on the grounds that the county owes them $187 million in repairs and upgrades:

Diamondbacks Managing General Partner Ken Kendrick said the team attempted to resolve the conflict out of court.

“We have made a promise to our fans, who have been partners with us on the building of this stadium and our franchise, to provide the best experience in all of baseball in a safe and welcoming environment,” he said in a written statement. “The inability of the Maricopa County Stadium District to fulfill its commitments has left us with no other option.”

Kendrick and his corporate overlords indeed no doubt saw this as their only option after county officials told them where to stick their stadium upgrade demands — whether than makes it a good option is another thing entirely. But given that the county report that identified the $187 million in needed (maybe “desired” is a better way of putting it) improvements in the first place also noted that $145 million of that was specifically on the team’s shoulders, it seems like the D-Backs owners are going to have an uphill battle in court, if they indeed plan to proceed to court and not just make this a negotiating gambit.

Anyway, expect the upcoming months, if not years, to now focus on questions of how to “solve the Diamondbacks stadium standoff” and where the team might try to relocate to if it successfully breaks its lease (which otherwise prohibits any move until 2028, or even talking about a move until 2024), much as we’ve seen in recent years with the Tampa Bay Rays. Which, come to think of it, is probably all the team owners want at this stage: to get people talking about replacing a 19-year-old stadium like it’s an urgent priority. There’s crazy, and then there’s crazy like a fox.

New Missouri gov says no state stadium funding, no way, no how

Sorry for the radio silence of the last few days: I was traveling, and while intending to get back to the stadium grind yesterday, a red-eye flight proved to be incompatible with a regular morning posting schedule. (Though I did find time to finish up some music writing I’d been working on, if that interests you.)

Thankfully, Missouri governor-elect Eric Greitens didn’t take the holidays off, greeting us to 2017 by upping the ante on his comments that MLS stadium funding would be “welfare to millionaires” with a great big raised middle finger to plans for state tax breaks for a St. Louis soccer stadium, telling journalists on Monday: “To be very clear, I have completely ruled out state funding for stadiums.”

Greitens reiterated his description of state aid for stadiums as ”welfare for millionaires” but said he “looks forward to meeting with the leaders of the MLS project to see if there’s a way for them to bring private-sector funding to bring a soccer team to the state of Missouri.”

“We are not going to use money from the people of the state of Missouri for what I believe is corporate welfare,” Greitens said. “We’ve got far too many core priorities of government that have to be invested in.”

That’s about as clear as clear can be. Without the $40 million in state tax credits, the MLS proposal has a (wait for it) $40 million hole in its budget, one that neither the city of St. Louis (which would already be putting up $89 million of its own public cash) nor the team’s prospective owners (who would already be, uh, paying the league’s $150 million expansion fee, what do you want from them, blood?) seems eager to fill. Stadium bill sponsor Ald. Christine Ingrassia remarked following Greitens’ remarks, “I was hoping to get to the point where this proposal made sense for St. Louis, but I’m feeling that less and less,” while Mayor Francis Slay’s chief of staff said, “It will be tough to get this done without the state’s support.”

Not that this kills the St. Louis MLS plan dead: $40 million isn’t an insurmountable gap, and the team owners aren’t likely to just walk away from that $89 million in city subsidies without trying to make it work. But with only three weeks before the deadline to get a vote on the April ballot, there isn’t much time to go back to the drawing board if they’re hoping to get something approved this year. Time for everybody to watch Lewis Reed really, really closely.

Either St. Louis MLS stadium funding is in trouble, or democracy is

That proposed MLS stadium for St. Louis that may be about to lose its $40 million state tax kickback could be facing trouble for its planned city subsidies as well, as apparently nobody gave the board of aldermen time to actually discuss funding bills before putting them up for an April vote:

One measure would raise the city’s sales tax by a half percent, with the revenue going to mass transit, public safety and economic development. A second measure would direct the corresponding increase in the use tax to the new stadium…

If [St. Louis Board of Aldermen President Lewis] Reed waits until next year to make those [committee] assignments — something that he’s well within his rights to do — aldermen would have just two weeks to pass the bills if they want the measures on the April ballot.

“I received the bills an hour before they wanted me to assign them,” Reed said. “We should have gotten that information a little bit earlier to really have an opportunity to take a look at the bills, understand what they are, their total impact, and the best assignment for them.”

This could easily be a screwup by the stadium’s sponsors, or it could be intentional: Corporate subsidy advocates haven’t been above throwing bills at legislators at the last minute to avoid scrutiny (or even leaving time for legislators to read the damn things), after all. Reed steered carefully down the middle on the proposed St. Louis Rams stadium subsidy, so it’s probably unlikely he’ll use this as an excuse to throw roadblocks in the way of the MLS deal; whether he’ll use this as an excuse to ram it through with little debate, we’ll see — though the fact that he’s griping publicly about not having enough time doesn’t seem promising for stadium subsidy backers.

Vikings stadium paneling keeps coming loose, because it’s windy

The Minnesota Vikings‘ new $1.1 billion stadium is only four months old, and already bits are falling off it:

Workers have repaired a missing strip of zinc paneling that fell from U.S. Bank Stadium’s western prow on Monday, prompting building contractor M.A. Mortenson Construction to reinforce the facade in hopes of preventing further damage from high winds.

Mortenson executive John Wood said Wednesday that the company, along with subcontractor McGrath, will install additional fasteners to exterior panels in the coming weeks…

Initially, the panels were bolted down only along the bottom edge. After heavy storms last summer, some panels came loose and flapped in the wind. Mortenson workers then reinforced the panels along the top edge.

None of this is a catastrophe or anything — the zinc panels turned out not to be fastened securely enough to hold up to severe weather, and the contractor will fix it under the building’s two-year warranty. But it’s a worthwhile reminder that buildings require upkeep, so something coming loose isn’t any more a sign that a stadium is in need of replacement when it’s four months old than when it’s 40 years old. Though if you want to go ahead and make “U.S. Bank Stadium is falling apart, time to build a new one” jokes, by all means be my guest.

Gov. Nixon gets more wrong on St. Louis MLS deal in three sentences than most can in lifetime

Lame duck Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon opened his mouth about the proposed St. Louis MLS stadium on Friday at a meeting with reporters, and this poured out:

“Folks may want to anguish a little bit over all this sort of stuff, but it’s the price of doing business,” Nixon said in a meeting with Post-Dispatch reporters downtown. “And quite frankly, we’re getting in, relative to what other areas of have done, so much more cost-effectively here.”…

“If we’re going to sit around the table and complain about this little part of the deal or that little part of the deal, then the $250 million to $300 million in private money that’s going to be invested will go somewhere else,” Nixon said, “and that site will sit there looking the way it is.”

Nixon has never been known for being the most savvy sports subsidy negotiator, but that’s a whole lot of stupid packed into just three sentences. Let’s break it down:

  • “It’s the price of doing business.” This is mostly meaningless rhetoric, but to the extent it has any meaning, it’s “this is the best deal we’re going to get.” Except the $129 million in state and city spending being proposed is literally the team owners’ first ask, so there’s no way to know whether this is the price of doing business or just what a couple of wannabe MLS owners decided they can sucker the public into giving them.
  • “We’re getting in, relative to what other areas of have done, so much more cost-effectively here.” There could be a word missing here in the transcript (“of have”?), but regardless, Nixon is off his rocker here, since this would be the second-largest MLS-only stadium subsidy ever, meaning that by definition more than 20 other areas have gotten off most cost-effectively. Unless he just means “ha ha ha ha, we’re making the city foot most of the bill instead of the state,” which is true, but not exactly what most people mean by “cost-effective.”
  • “The $250 million to $300 million in private money that’s going to be invested will go somewhere else.” Of that private money, $150 million will go into the pockets of the other MLS owners as an expansion fee — and that will happen regardless of whether a team goes to St. Louis or some other city. (In fact, you could even argue that it would be better for the Missouri economy if the St. Louis-based prospective owners didn’t waste their money on an MLS team, and instead spent it on something else local.) The team would be putting about $71 million into actual construction, but since it would also be taking up a piece of land that then couldn’t be used for anything else ever, not to mention $129 million in public money that couldn’t be used for anything else, that’s not necessarily a plus even if you think the land would likely remain undeveloped for a while otherwise.

Nixon was, by all accounts, a successful litigator and popular state attorney general before becoming governor, so you’d think he might know a little bit more about haggling than he’s shown with his sports dealings. Guess there’s really no accounting for the effect of the toy department.

Missouri delays $40m soccer subsidy ruling, St. Louis team owners may grub for money elsewhere

Okay, didn’t see that coming: One day after Missouri governor-elect Eric Greitens called the local soccer team’s $129 million stadium subsidy request “nothing more than welfare for millionaires,” the team’s owners asked a state board to delay a meeting on $40 million in state tax credits for the project, saying they may look for another source of funding:

[SC STL vice chairman] Kavanaugh said the ownership group is working on contingencies in the event it can’t secure the $40 million in tax credits, but those ideas are in the early stages. He said losing out on the state contribution wouldn’t necessarily derail the group’s efforts at an MLS team.

“We are thinking of other options to fill in the potential hole,” Kavanaugh said.

(If you’re confused about the team name, by the way, that’s because it’s confusing: Kavanaugh currently owns the minor-league St. Louis F.C., but the larger group seeking an MLS team is called SC STL, which may or may not be the name that the MLS team goes by, if it ever comes into being.)

With the board meeting now delayed in 2017, it looks like Greitens will be overseeing any state share of the stadium deal after all, which explains why Kavanaugh is looking for a Plan B. If you’re hoping that it will be “ask the private investors who’d get the benefits of a stadium to cough up some more money, especially what with MLS reducing its expansion fee for its next two franchises from $200 million to $150 million,” Kavanaugh is already crying poor:

“Personally, growing up from a father who was a brick layer, I don’t come from money and any money I’ve made I’d say it has been earned,” Kavanaugh said by phone. “There’s a lot that personally speaking for myself and my partners we have given back in a number of ways and still plan on doing that in the community here.”

Kavanaugh had a brief career as a pro soccer player before co-founding a tech company with his friend David Steward, who likewise was born into wealth, so it’s true they’re not old-money millionaires. Still, he co-owns a company with $7.4 billion a year in annual revenues, so if he really needs $40 million, he has other places he can go other than the state of Missouri. Here’s guessing that he’ll end up asking the city of St. Louis instead, but there’s always hope that by “giving back to the community” Kavanaugh actually means “paying for my own stuff already.”

Missouri governor-elect calls St. Louis soccer stadium plan “welfare for millionaires”

I admittedly hadn’t noticed that Missouri elected Eric Greitens as governor until yesterday, but he’s sure on my radar now:

Missouri Gov.-elect Eric Greitens said he opposes public funding for a Major League Soccer stadium in downtown St. Louis, according to a statement released by his transition team Monday.

“This project is nothing more than welfare for millionaires,” Greitens said. “Right now, because of reckless spending by career politicians, we can’t even afford the core functions of government, let alone spend millions on soccer stadiums.

“This back-room wheeling and dealing is exactly what frustrates Missourians.”

The St. Louis MLS stadium project certainly qualifies as welfare for millionaires, involving $129 million in public cash, land, and tax credits to build a $200 million stadium. That’s not the sort of thing that governors usually say aloud, but Greitens has an unusual resumé, mixing altruism with serving in the Navy SEALs with hating on unions (he’s also the first-ever Jewish governor of Missouri), so maybe it’s not entirely unexpected.

Also, probably not entirely likely to do much, since the state Development Finance Board is set to vote on the city’s request for tax credits today, before Greitens takes office, and the rest of the stadium decision will be up to St. Louis city officials and voters. Still and all, it’s not going to help the soccer team’s ballot campaign to have the governor-elect publicly call them a bunch of rich guys with their hands out.

Omaha mayoral candidate fantasizes that he can get an NFL team, also that he can be Omaha mayor

There is much stress and sadness in the world today, so let’s all laugh at this guy:

A 26-year-old political novice is entering the 2017 Omaha mayor’s race with a proposal to bring an NFL team to Omaha.

Taylor Royal, a Republican accountant who is an Omaha native, … proposes that the city build a football stadium and either petition the NFL to create a new team or recruit a current team to move to Omaha.

Royal believes that a team would broaden the tax base and create excitement in the city.

Now, this isn’t entirely crazy: As I’ve pointed out a million times before, thanks to those big national TV contracts that every NFL team owner gets a cut of, you could put a team in the Gobi Desert and still turn a profit, so why not Omaha? Except that the league would hate it (both because it would hurt at TV contract negotiation time and because an Omaha team wouldn’t bring in much in the way of ad sales or luxury suite money), and Omaha already doesn’t have enough money to fix its crumbling roads, and bwahaha “broaden the tax base.” Not to mention the fact that Omaha is the actual poster child for not having sports teams.

On the bright side, this “26-year-old political novice” managed to get some national news coverage for his campaign, just by declaring his commitment to a plan that was attention-getting, albeit not in a good way. On the less bright side, this is what he’s going with as his campaign photo:

584b973f9c68d-imageGood thing for him there’s no such thing as bad publicity, I guess?

Send money to Field of Schemes, I send you stuff! Just like a stadium deal, only you get stuff!

It’s been quite a year, 2016, both in the stadium world — from St. Louis Rams owner Stan Kroenke turning up his nose at a $477 million stadium subsidy offer to go build his own stadium in Los Angeles, to the sad, hilarious Hartford Yard Goats endless road trip saga, to the city of Arlington voting to give the Texas Rangers owners $500 million to build a new stadium because their 22-year-old one lacked air-conditioning. (I think there may have been something else of import that happened on Election Day, too, but it’s escaping me at the moment.) I also published a new book, and got a new job. So, it’s been a busy time.

With this year finally winding down, that means it’s time for my semi-annual site supporters’ drive, where you send me money so I can keep on doing what I do here and I send you various tangible and intangible goodies. For 2017, the tchotchke tally will amount to:

  • Full supporters ($100 for one year, $50 for six months) continue to get a free banner ad at the top right-hand corner of this site — either supply your own 250×90 image, or I can design one for you. I reserve the right to reject inappropriate or inaccurate messages, though that’s never happened yet.
  • All full supporters will now receive a signed paperback copy of my new book The Brooklyn Wars, which features much investigation of my home borough’s new basketball arena and minor-league baseball stadium and their effect on development, plus other tales of the evolution of the world’s trendiest borough.
  • Everyone, including both full supporters and $25 mini-supporters, gets: a one-inch members-only pin (pictured at right); two limited-edition sets of stadium trading cards (one now, the other when I finish it, which will be real soon now I promise); and a reprint of issue #9 of Brooklyn Metro Times, the self-published zine containing the article by myself and Joanna Cagan that sent us down the road to our book and this site. Plus an electronic copy of The Brooklyn Wars in PDF, ePub, or Kindle format.

And if that’s not enough, you also get the warm, fuzzy feeling that comes with knowing that I can take the time to keep bringing you daily news about the gotta-laugh-to-keep-from-crying world of stadium subsidies, which seems determined to keep on going indefinitely, despite a lot of people’s best efforts to declare it terminally stupid. And my eternal thanks, which I really do mean from the bottom of my heart — news blogging can be a lonely enterprise, and hearing from you all via your comments and emails and tweets and Grants and Benjamins helps me remember that this is important to you all, and that hopefully I’m performing a useful service by providing the latest news and analysis and a place to make crappy Simpsons-reference jokes about it.

Click the button below if you care to begin or renew a supporters’ subscription. And if you pay with Paypal, please remember to enter your mailing address under instructions, so that I can send you stuff without having to ask. (Who am I kidding — nobody is going to remember, and I’ll just email you. That’s fine.)

Thanks, have a happy holidays, and see you back here shortly with more news.

UPDATE: If you were having any trouble with the payment button earlier, try again — it should be working now.


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St. Louis mayor wants sales-tax hike to pay for MLS stadium so owner can drop $200m on expansion fee

Whole lotta news swirling around the proposed St. Louis MLS stadium (and team), as Mayor Francis Slay prepares for an April public vote on the team’s proposed $129 million subsidy:

  • While $40 million for the deal would come from state tax credits, and another $9 million from state land preparation funds, the source of the city’s $80 million in cash was unknown until now. Slay’s idea: Hike city sales taxes by half a percentage point (from 8.67% to 9.17%) and use the proceeds for a whole bunch of stuff, including light rail, job training, surveillance cameras to reduce crime — and an MLS stadium. (Technically the stadium money would come from a “use tax” on purchases of out-of-state products, but it’s essentially the same mechanism.) This is, needless to say, money that if raised could be spent on anything else — and the raising of which doesn’t come without a cost to the local economy, as the city across the state was warned a decade ago.
  • MLS commissioner Don Garber called the vote on stadium subsidies a “referendum” on whether they want an MLS stadium at all, which isn’t a take-it-or-leave-it blackmail threat at all, gosh no.
  • Prospective team owner (and former Bain Capital exec and Boston Celtics /AS Roma minority owner) Paul Edgerley continues to tout his “$400 million of private money” in the deal, which pointedly ignores that 1) half of that is for the expansion fee MLS is charging him for the team itself and 2) most of the rest would be covered by the public subsidy.
  • If Edgerley also wants to get property taxes from the blocks around the stadium kicked back to help pay his costs via a TIF — he’s not answering questions on the topic — then a previous city deal means even more tax money could be diverted to an unrelated private developer in the area.

The April vote — which, let’s be reminded, is only required because a bunch of community activists passed a law in the wake of the St. Louis Cardinals stadium subsidy 14 years ago — would come in two parts, one to raise the sales tax, and one to devote a portion of it to the stadium. No polling yet to indicate where voters stand, but as I noted to a St. Louis reporter yesterday, this is an awfully big ask for an MLS team, given that in contrast to more established sports, the response of most voters to the threat of “You’ll never get a pro soccer team if you don’t do this” is likely to be “Wait, there’s pro soccer now?”

That’s a big part of the reason why MLS subsidy demands tend to be more modest — I don’t have the full numbers, but I believe this would be the second-biggest subsidy request behind the $183 million D.C. United stadium deal. As such, this is looking more and more like a test case, not just for whether MLS can successfully demand $200 million apiece for one of its increasingly innumerable franchises, but whether the team owners can turn around and shake down a city bereft over the loss of its NFL franchise to cover a large chunk of the nut. This is going to be quite the 2017.