And then there’s this, from Deadspin:
Missouri senator Claire McCaskill says that she is drafting legislation that would require professional sports franchises that skip town prematurely to refund the public. St. Louis now has no NFL team, but incredibly, the city, county, and state still owe a combined $152 million to pay off the Edward Jones Dome…
The likelihood of a bill of this nature ever actually being passed, of course, is slim-to-none. But as a senator McCaskill wields enormous influence, and just the threat of legislation could be enough to compel professional sports leagues to do something that would reduce the brazen fleecing of cities and states.
Um, yeah. First off, let’s note (as Deadspin itself acknowledges) that McCaskill supported paying Rams owner Stan Kroenke $477 million toward a new stadium 20 years after building the Jones Dome with taxpayer money, so this is almost certainly playing to the crowd’s anger by threatening Kroenke with legislation that will never come to pass. (McCaskill also suggested that the NFL could be in violation of antitrust laws if it didn’t follow its own bylaws by forcing the Rams to stay in St. Louis, which, what?) Teams moving out of stadiums that aren’t finished being paid off is an easy thing to complain about, but when you think about it, it wouldn’t be any better a deal for St. Louis if they’d sold 20-year bonds and already paid them off faster rather than having another decade to go, so why should team owners’ responsibility to their cities be dependent on what kind of financing tools were used to borrow the money?
Though I should also note that if this somehow did become law, it would provide an easy way to ensure that teams stay put indefinitely: Just refinance every few years to push your stadium debt out into the future, like Robert Moses used to do with his bridges so he could keep on keeping toll money in perpetuity. Shh, don’t tell anyone I said it, maybe we can pull this off!
Bottom line should be, what was in the contract and why. If government people did not protect the interests of the taxpayers/citizens, the government employees should be fired for incompetence or jailed for malfeasance.
Typical politician BS. Let’s pander to the public even though we can’t or wont change anything. The fact that she supported giving Kroenke $477 million towards a new stadium after being screwed over by the team 20 years ago is an f’n joke.
Agreed it shouldn’t be in the law, but it should be in the lease.
If cities are hellbent on giving a sweetheart lease to a sports team they need to carefully read the leases on Tropicana Field (which Rays just got option to terminate last night as Neil reports) and FedExForum as a case study on what to do.
Then they can read the lease my dumb city gave the Rams on the Jones Dome for what not to do.
I’m not convinced putting in the lease helps either. If your or I go bankrupt, any landlord would be crazy to say, “But you’re still going to pay your lease payment, right?”.
When do teams ever go bankrupt, the Coyotes notwithstanding?
Impending financial doom is very often a threat when these teams start demanding arenas. I’d say most of them have used that as part of their argument. Isn’t that more-or-less what the Rams did?
I still can’t believe that 20 year old stadium isn’t good enough. It’s really sickening.
St. Louis is at fault with their financial problem with the dump JonesDome…..they did not keep it up to be a top tier stadium in the NFL as stated in their contract with the RAMS. Good riddance St. Louis!
“Impending financial doom is very often a threat when these teams start demanding arenas.”
May be a threat, but it’s never true, except maybe in hockey.
certainly a lesson for all cities playing the stadium / arena game. Maybe what people should start demanding of these sports franchises is controlling shares in the teams much like a Green Bay. The population can have the say of schools , hospitals roads or sports venues for their tax dollars to be spent . I know that indeed sounds weird but those choices are really being decided by crony capitalism between politicians and big business. You notice in the only league globally with team values being on the scale of the NFL , English Premiership soccer, there is no movement of teams and in many cases the stadiums are 50 to a 100 years old IE Villa Nova. The ownership is some cases owns NFL teams or once did like Glazer. I am Canadian and just see it from a prospective in which we should not be seeing taxpayers waste in 2016 . The Canadian Football League has started a drive for new stadiums with taxpayers funding and in the case of Winnipeg we are seeing financial problems with a new stadium two or three years old. reminds me of the Florida Marlins
I imagine if that were in effect the team would just make the new city pay the balance.
That’d be money a team owner couldn’t then demand for himself, then.
@ Mary – But it’s not municipal employees who vote to approve these contracts which are not in the best interests of the taxpayers – it’s elected officials, who receive lots of dollars from outside entities (sports teams, developers, etc.) and then vote in favor of what the outside entities wants. Yes, it’s wrong and yes, people should vote for candidates who will put the interests of the taxpayers first, but campaign spending matters and the outside entities pour money into electing candidates whose votes can be controlled. And, of course, they pour money into getting ballot measures passed which are in favor of the outside entities (sports teams, developers, etc.)
That’s what we have here in Santa Clara, and maybe, just maybe, things have gotten bad enough here (with the obvious deceit from our elected officials) that in the 2016 election people will vote for candidates other than those whose votes appear to be controlled by the outside entities. One can hope, but hundreds of thousands of dollars will be poured into keeping ‘yes’ votes on the council for whatever the outside entities want. And candidates who actually will represent the people don’t get that kind of campaign funding.
Santa Claran: You can blame outside money all you like and it is not without merit, but at the end it is up to voters. San Francisco rejected public financing for the 49ers time and again. Oakland is taking a tough line on the Raiders and A’s.
However, more to the point, look up the East Bay to Richmond. Chevron spent an unprecedented $3M, $30 per resident, on their city election. They lost. Not only was their preferred mayoral candidate defeated but every single candidate for the city council that Chevron backed lost as well.
A single NFL franchise is a pretty pipsqueak special interest compared to the oil company that ranks #3 on the Fortune 500.
You can say Santa Clara got a raw deal and I don’t disagree, but the voters voted and that’s what they wanted. They knew it was a raw deal when they voted for it anyways. If anything the way it has worked out so far is better than the deal they thought they were getting.
Public votes are better than no public votes, but the influence of money is still pretty strong there. Stadiums are almost always* approved when the proponents outspend the opponents more than 100-to-1, and almost never when they don’t.
*Not a scientific study, but I have a hard drive full of data points that point in that direction.
In a time crunched society and with much of the news media in bed with the sports industry, it is hard to simply blame this all on the voters. Who even bothers to run for office and how does one become better informed for their vote? The system is rigged. Santa Claran, as far as the elected politicians being the major culprits (I probably agree), I think citizens should be able to also legally pursue elected officials for incompetence, malfeasance, racketeering, etc, but it is probably difficult and costly whether the goons are elected or not. That does not mean someone should not try anyway. Unfortunately, having deep pockets and time for accountants, lawyers, and advertising seem to be the surest way to exercise our freedoms.
@ Scola, for the June 2010 Measure J 49ers stadium ballot measure, Yes on J (primarily Jed York funding Santa Clarans for Economic Progress, an astroturf group) spent $5 million, which ended up being $350 in campaign spending for every yes vote. Santa Clara Plays Fair tracked the campaign spending through time vs. the polling numbers, and the data show that the more money spent, the more the polling results tipped to the ‘yes’ side. There’s no requirement for truth in advertising in campaigning, and many voters here now feel duped by our elected officials.
It remains to be seen if in 2016 voters will be smart enough to oust the culprits on our city council who do not represent the people here.
I recall a good friend saying prior to the June 2010 stadium ballot measure, that if the Yes side wins, that means football money will pour into our council elections to keep a stadium friendly council – and that’s exactly what has happened. Disgusting, really.