The Cleveland city council voted 13-3 last night to grant approval for a $435 million renovation of the Guardians‘ stadium, most of which will be paid for with public money. To recap the price list:
- The city of Cleveland will contribute $8 million a year for the next 15 years, from city parking revenues, Guardians ticket taxes, naming rights from a parking garage, and maybe additional sources if that’s not enough.
- Cuyahoga County, which already approved the plan two weeks ago, will kick in $9 million a year, from hotel taxes and alcohol and cigarette sales taxes.
- The state of Ohio has yet to approve $2 million a year in its own funding, but with Gov. Mike DeWine strongly backing it and the city and county already having signed off, it’s hard to see it being a sticking point.
- Guardians owner Paul Dolan will provide $150 million.
- The city and county have the option to extend the team’s lease for an additional five years, through 2041, but it will cost them an extra $112.5 million.
At $19 million a year in subsidies, this will be the second-priciest lease extension public expense in sports history, after the Indiana Pacers‘ Herb Simon somehow getting $600 million for a 25-year lease extension. The $285 million total price tag — or $397.5 million if Cleveland opts for the extended warranty — comes just 27 years after Cleveland taxpayers spent around $350 million to build the stadium in the first place, and just five years after the city gave $57 million worth of future tax revenues to the team to pay for more modest renovations to the place.
We’ve already discussed this deal at great length, and really there isn’t much more to say: Dolan has succeeded in turning his 1990s-era stadium into a subsidy gift that keeps on giving, and he’s set himself up to be able to demand even more renovations — or a whole new stadium — 15 years from now. That the whole process took place without much public debate, and without Dolan or his elected official pals even overtly threatening that the team would leave town otherwise, is a clear sign that we have not made very much progress in terms of transparency or analyzing the costs and benefits of sports subsidies since Dolan’s predecessor as team owner, Richard Jacobs, shook down Cleveland for stadium money in the first place in the early ’90s. And you have to figure that other owners of sports teams with stadiums of similar vintage — and there are a ton of them, since the early ’90s was when the new-stadium boom really kicked in — are going to be looking at this and thinking of how to replicate this in their own cities, and … yeah, this whole thing really is taking longer than I thought.
So proud we’re giving over half a billion dollars to a team too cheap to splurge on free agency but so mortified to tank, as well, that we’re just gonna float around the 7th-10th playoff spots every year and never be legitimate playoff contenders.
Plus their sign is crooked:
https://www.news5cleveland.com/sports/cleveland-guardians/cleveland-guardians-sign-at-progressive-field-looks-like-its-not-centered-correctly
Maybe by installing the name on an angle they think they can evade the trademark infringement claim.
The Guardian Angles
Nice! If it was about accuracy maybe they should go for the Cleveland Shakedown Kings?
I was talking about the Pacers deal, but the Guardians situation isn’t exactly something worth bragging about.
There is plenty of shame to go around.
Hey, how fortunate for everyone the Cleveland Council got this done just before the lockout was imposed (largely by the same people seeking the welfare for billionaires).
Just lucky I guess.
I’ve been asking around and it’s not at all clear that the State is actually contributing that $2MM/yr.
State Legislative website: [nothing pending or proposed]
State budget: [nothing]
Media reports: [nothing new since a cleveland-dot-com article in August mentioned DeWine’s vague support]
City Council member: [doesn’t reply]
County Council member: basically “Good point, let me go find out.”
State Representative: basically “Whoops, wait, wut?”
Governor’s staff: [phone tag]
I honestly think there’s a significant chance that the state funding is completely fake.
One really interesting aspect of this deal is that the State of Ohio *is not a party to it.* The four parties to the planned contract are: City of Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Cleveland Guardians, and Gateway Economic Development Corporation.
https://schumann.cleveland.oh.us/wp-content/uploads/sites/9/2021/12/844-2021-A-FILE-Cooperative-Agreement-for-Cleveland-Indians.pdf