September 29, 2005
Jets, Giants deal on again?
It's been a rollercoaster ride of a week for New Jersey's plans for a combined New York Jets/Giants stadium, coming into today's state-imposed deadline for a deal. Yesterday, word was that the talks were going nowhere, that the Jets were looking hard at building in Queens instead, and that Gov. Richard Codey was threatening to go it alone with the Giants and cut the Jets out of the deal. If that was all just last-minute posturing, apparently it worked: Codey now says the two sides have worked out most of their differences, with the Jets dropping requests for development rights to nearby state land and for their sales taxes to count as rent payments - man, would that have been a bad idea - while the Giants agreed to rework their project design in consultation with the Jets and the NFL. Talks could presumably still break down again, but it's looking more and more likely that New York's two football teams will be sharing a New Jersey home for the foreseeable future.
