D.C. council to vote today on revised United stadium bill that cuts subsidies from $180m all the way to $168m

So we now know what the D.C. council is going to vote on as its revised D.C. United stadium funding plan today:

• Instead of swapping the city-owned Reeves Center office building for stadium land, the District would spend $37 million out of its existing capital budget, borrow an additional $62 million, and repay that … somehow. That bit would need to be figured out in a supplemental budget request, either by current mayor Vincent Gray, or by new mayor Muriel Bowser when she takes over in January.
• D.C. United would no longer get sales-tax kickbacks worth $7 million, but would still get property-tax breaks worth $43 million. “Cutting all of the abatements might be a wonderful idea, but what is before us is the result of negotiations,” explained council president Phil Mendelson, if you have a lenient definition of “explained.”

This, then, is pretty similar to the fairly crappy deal that the D.C. council was considering earlier this year: The city would still be spending $90 million on land, plus $35 million on infrastructure, plus $43 million on property-tax breaks, for a total public cost of $168 million, which unless I’m mistaken would be the biggest MLS stadium subsidy in history. And all of the risks of the old deal would remain in place, plus the added risks of what happens if an eminent-domain court rules that the city has to pay more than $90 million for the stadium land, plus how this would constrain D.C. in future uses of its capital budget.

That said, it may still be a crappy deal, but it’s this council’s crappy deal now, so expect that it will likely be voted in. (Then the council will have to vote on it again later this month, because that’s how they do things in D.C.) Watch the council debate live here way at the end of the hearing that starts at 11 am, once they’re done with the Marion S. Barry, Jr., Ceremonial Recognition Resolution of 2014 and the D.C. Rocks, So We Need One Act of 2014.