You know what I was just thinking Canada really needs? Another stadium demand:
The president and chief operating officer of the Calgary Stampeders held a news conference on Monday afternoon to stress that McMahon Stadium is in need of a serious facelift and that it’s also time for interested stakeholders to step up.
“I’m sure the people are aware,” he said. “Especially our fans, our sponsors, and everyone else that it’s critical for the Stampeders and this franchise and, I believe, this city for us to address a 50-year-old facility.”
For now, Stampeders president Lyle Bauer is just calling for renovated “concessions, washrooms, and general concourse amenities” at 51-year-old McMahon Stadium, and hasn’t put a price tag on it, let alone specified who’d pay. Still, consider it a warning shot across the bow: If everybody else is getting new or rehabbed stadiums, the Stamps want their piece of the action.
Just once I’d like to see one of these loudmouth team principals (and Bauer has done this in Winnipeg as well) actually put a few minutes work into a business plan and drum up a little corporate support before speaking.
While I have serious misgivings about public money being used to benefit a private business (particularly sports teams, though CFL clubs aren’t the profit generating entities that some of their brethren are), it is a different matter if they have raised, say, $30m in private funds themselves and are looking for matching or partial matching funds from the public sector.
Otherwise it’s just the old ham & eggs routine. Like most people (even sports fans), I’m really sick of that…