A new link and my Favorite Rant

If you've spent more than 5 minutes in the same room with me, you are likely aware that publicly financed stadium constuction is perhaps the world's greatest evil. I could go on for hours, but instead I've just added a new link to Neil DeMause's excellent Field of Schemes website/blog, which adds a dry wit to a summary of the current headlines on the topic.

For those that are uneducated as to the issues involved, there are 3 cardinal rules that assure you and I will continue to pay for palaces that allow billionaires to continue to profit off of the athletic achievements of multi-millionaires.

First, owners (and to an even greater extent commissioners) do NOT care about their local communities. Any rational fan has long since accepted - and for that matter, the owners freely admit - that sports are a business; but if so, why do they need such obscene public subsidies? Other forms of entertainment - museums, operas, orchestras and theaters - also receive public subsidies, but unlike sports teams these are not businesses. Why? Because they are [mostly] non-competitive. In addition, to the best of my knowledge, the MoMA did not threaten to move to NoVa in order to fund their new facility.

Second, in order to get a stadium built, the pro-stadium forces can try as many times as they like, but only need to succeed once. Conversely, the anti-stadium coalition (if any), needs to have a perfect record in order to succeed. Flags fly forever, and once the stadium is approved, the team has won...at least for now.

Third, the complexity of the deals by which your hard-earned tax dollars get wasted will double in complexity every 18 months. Call it Moore's Law of Stadia. In the Good Old Days, your friendly city council and/or state legislature would simply shell out cash to build a stadium - and yet somehow it would end up privately owned, with only minimal tax revenue going to the state. Voters eventually got wise to this method (maybe it was the sweepstakes-style big checks that tipped 'em off), so now the method of paying for your new 9-figure piece of civic pride is a complex mix of tax-emempt bonds, property/sales tax subsidies, land acquisition payments and, in the case of MLB, lower revenue sharing payments. Nowhere is the complexity of the deals clearer than in my hometown. A degree in economics is not enough to figure out either of these deals...and even then there are probably subsidies that we aren't even being told about!

So i'm sure you are now asking..."What can I do to stop this travesty?" Short answer: vote. If you say live in Minnesota (probably the most enlightened anti-stadium state), the approval of Corporate Sponsor TBA Field by a one-vote margin in the State Senate is certain to be a big issue in the fall. Find out if your representative represented your best interests, and if not, kick the bum out and explain to all your friends why they should do the same. I like new stadiums as much as the next guy...but this is about priorities.