December 26, 2007
No, not that kind of Ford Center rehab
If you ever read anything speculating on the "shelf life" of pro sports facilities, look no further than Oklahoma City, where Mayor Mick Cornett announced last week a March 4 referendum to spend more than $100 million, funded by extension of a sales-tax surcharge, on upgrades to the Ford Center. That'd be the Ford Center that opened all the way back in June 2002, making it perhaps the first five-and-a-half-year-old ever in need of a facelift. (Best straight-faced headline on this is from the Oklahoman: "Mayor says tax will make arena like new.")
Cornett's argument is that with perhaps $125 million in improvements tacked on to the arena's original $90 million price tag, the city could have a state-of-the-art arena at a cheaper cost than the last idea floated, which was to tear it down and build a whole new building. On the downside, Cornett is proposing again building on spec, without a major sports team signed as a tenant - and that's a recipe for extortionate lease demands, possibly including even more public spending on upgrades, as Oklahoma City already found out once.
Cornett did promise that the arena upgrades will be put off if the Seattle Sonics don't agree to move to Oklahoma City, saying, "We're not going to build something we don't need." The trick, then, will be to approve the upgrades, use them to convince the NBA to approve a Sonics move during an April vote, wait out Seattle's lawsuit trying to hold the Sonics to their lease through 2010, and then negotiate a lease with the team that doesn't give away the store. Given Cornett's performance striking a deal with the Hornets, there's not a lot of reason for optimism, but I guess anything's possible.
