It’s finally a bit of a slow news week, and I didn’t post anything yesterday, which usually means I would try to post something today, but all there is is this item about the owners of the Single-A Modesto Nuts looking to build a new stadium for — I’m sorry, how much money?
The proposal is based on Modesto and Stanislaus County providing the bulk of the funding for the stadium, which has a preliminary estimate of $85 million to $122 million. The proposal calls for private investment of $5 million to $10 million, and the city and county issuing bond debt to cover the balance.
That’s right, the Nuts owners — or technically “a group of Modesto business and civic leaders,” but surely they’re doing it on behalf of the Nuts owners, who in this case happen to be the owners of the Seattle Mariners — are looking to get as much as $117 million for a stadium for their lowest-rung minor-league affiliate, which would hold all of 5,000 fans (11,500 for concerts). That’s still slightly short of the reigning minor-league stadium subsidy record of $150 million for the Worcester Red Sox, but at least that’s a Triple-A stadium that holds 9,500 fans, even if it does look like a giant shipping container. Spending $117 million for a Single-A stadium is unheard of, or I guess was unheard of, until now. How is the Modesto business coalition trying to justify this crazy taxpayer expense?
Lynn Dickerson, the former Gallo Center for the Arts CEO and a member of the stadium project team, said it would not only provide the Nuts with a new venue but help with the revitalization of downtown and make Modesto a destination for residents from across the Central Valley and the Bay Area.
Yes, surely San Francisco residents will regularly make the hour and a half drive to watch the Mariners’ youngest minor-leaguers once they can sit in a new 5,000-seat stadium rather than the old 4,000-seat one. What else ya got?
Stadium proponents say it would help make Modesto a more attractive, desirable city and draw high-skilled, high-wage workers and spur the building of offices, housing and stores in downtown.
Okay, that’s about enough of that. There’s reportedly an economic impact study that the stadium proponents have given to the city and county, but the Modesto Bee doesn’t link to it or quote from it, either because they haven’t been allowed to see it or they can’t be bothered to read it, they don’t say which.
Scroll way down in the article, though, and you start to see where the Nuts owners and their friends are getting their chutzpah:
One reason plans were drawn up so quickly is Major League Baseball’s new facilities requirements for minor league teams. Under the new regulations, the Nuts will have to upgrade John Thurman Field, which opened in the mid-1950s, or submit to the MLB a plan for a new stadium by the start of the 2023 season.
The proponents of the new stadium say failure to do so could result in a fine or the revocation of team rights in Modesto and the end of minor league baseball here.
Yep, this is just one more bit of fallout from MLB’s takeover and downsizing of the minor leagues, which has allowed them to hold teams for ransom if local communities don’t cough up money for new stadiums. The difference is that nobody has asked for $117 million for one until now, but as Boyett Petroleum president Dave Boyett, a member of the stadium committee, told the Bee: “People said they’ve talked about a downtown stadium for years. I mean, I’ve talked about wanting to go to Mars, but somebody’s got to start somewhere.” Sure, next minor-league team up for a new stadium may as well ask for a rocket to Mars as part of the deal — after all, you can’t get if you don’t ask.
I keep thinking that the tide will somehow turn and people will realize that this is not where civic money should go. I’m very naive.
I predicted the tide was turning once, back around 2003. I learned my lesson.
Griffey Park is 20 years old now, it won’t be long before this ownership starts talking renovation or even replacement, and we’ll need public participation of course . Got to invest if you want see a winner. Come to think of it, Seahawks Stadium is 20 this upcoming year. The prime tenant may or may not be up for sale, should we expect public investment opportunities to follow there as well? Does gravity get you down?
A few years ago, the Seahawks and the Mariners each signed long lease extensions for their respective stadiums, both of which include financial commitments from the landlord and tenant for maintenance and repairs, as well as certain prescribed renovations. The lease extensions were not without controversy, but they were finalized.
Former Seattle SuperSonics fans have views on the efficacy of leases binding the decisions of owners looking for big changes at public expense when less than a decade has passed.
Funny enough, I am a SuperSonics fan from day 1. My life will not be complete until they return.
My first pro team of any kind from their second year. Miss’em loads, but the NBA can stay away. Bad faith matters.
Yes,the only people who prosper from a stadium is the wealthy who get a one time big tax writeoff.Once the stadium is built.There are only low paying dead end seasonal jobs.And when it’s not in use the taxpayers have to care for it like a child or it will become a major blackeye for downtown Modesto.I never see any high paying career oriented jobs in a ballpark.Only the building contractors,make the big money.
The stadium was rebuilt in 1997 so saying it “opened” in the ’50s just because there was a different stadium on the same site is disingenuous.
The problem is that the ’97 incarnation came prefabricated, I believe from the same company that created Lake Olmstead Stadium in Augusta, GA, so it looks like an aluminum version of a stadium from the ’50s. Kind of surprised that Lancaster, CA lost their team in the Great Minor League Purge but Modesto and Visalia didn’t.
Throwing away all that money for a mere Single-A team is one of many indicators that the “Baseball Economy” (a term I love to use) is a completely broken system thanks to ultra greedy team owners. It’s honestly no wonder why Independent Minor League Baseball was raided by MLB recently (I don’t hold back…) and some leagues were given the stupid gold star status of “MLB Partner Leagues”. MLB wants to own everything through their greed and arrogance, so of course one aspect of this would be to keep inflating prices of even the Single-A baseball stadiums.
The never-ending obsession of needing to improve stadiums and the markets teams play in (Indy Ball Leagues who are now Partner Leagues, I stare at you…) have alienated so many fanbases throughout the years and thrown them into Summer-Collegiate Baseball Hell, so to speak.
Seriously, I could write an entire e-book on the Baseball Economy system.
Stadium proponents say it would help make Modesto a more attractive, desirable city
Nope. at the end of the day it still will be Modesto with $100 million anchor to it.
Or Modesto with about $200m less to invest in other things over the next 25-30 years.
I wish opportunity cost was discussed more by both the public and their elected officials when sports facilities are brought up.
Sure, a new ballpark might bring some people downtown on nights when they otherwise wouldn’t. But is there another way to do that more effectively for far less money than committing $110m + financing costs to a ballpark that is going to be used max 55 days a year?
I thought that California passed a law that governments in California couldn’t spend public money on stadiums for private owners?
I don’t understand why all the minor league owners didn’t stand together against the MLB takeover. Where was MLB going to go find another 120 cities to play minor league ball? They could hold their players in extended spring camp for a while but that’s untenable long term.
MLB picked the perfect time as minor league owners were already hurting for revenue from not playing the previous year. It’s a darn shame but they could do it this year-sorry, we’re not fixing up our stadiums unless MLB pays for it! Darn it, there’s probably something in the language of the new contracts about teams going out on strike . Besides, trying to get minor league team owners to work together in their own best interests is like herding cats…..
They’re proposing funding through bonds. How will the bonds be paid off? If through stadium income, then it’s not a big deal. This post needs more detail before provoking a big anti-stadium backlash.
The public funding source is listed as the city and county “share of the revenues generated by the stadium and the increased tax revenues that would come from the development the stadium would bring.” The latter half of that isn’t actually stadium income — it’s tax money that would normally go to the general fund, except in this case it’s being kicked back to the Mariners to pay for the stadium. If it materializes, which it may or may not.
I would have reported on exactly how much in stadium revenues and how much in tax kickbacks is planned for paying off the public bonds, but the Modesto Bee didn’t bother to report that, or to indicate who did the economic study so I could look at it myself. And nobody else in Northern California is reporting on this, because the journalism industry died a few years back, so … this is the most detail you get for now, I’m afraid.
You can say the owners are Nuts.
(Mic drop)