Arizona's Maricopa County Board has backbone

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Too many cities/counties spent ton of taxpayer's money to beg sport team owners to stay, Maricopa County has the gut to tell the president and owners of Diamondbacks baseball team to ...

Quote:
The Arizona Diamondbacks would like to use public money to help fund $65 million worth of upgrades to Chase Field.

The Maricopa County board has denied much of that request, saying the repairs don't align with requirements of the lease agreement.

Documents obtained by the Arizona Republic detail a nasty feud between County Supervisor Andy Kunasek and team president Derrick Hall.

Kunasek sent a letter to Hall in April saying the baseball business is "evolving into a parasitic enterprise." Hall described Kunasek's letter as a "verbal assault," but Hall wasn't the only target.


Quote:
Kunasek, who told the Republic on Friday that he will not run for re-election this year, also targeted county board members whom he said are doing "irreparable harm" to taxpayer confidence in government. In When Kunasek hand delivered the letter to the Diamondbacks, he's quoted in session notes (per the Republic) telling owner Ken Kendrick, a West Virginia native and WVU alumnus, to "take your stupid baseball team and get out" and go back to "f—ing West Virginia."


https://www.yahoo.com/sports/news/arizona-board-wont-budge-d-231842058.html
 
That is awesome! A successful business should not need the state as a source of investment. They hold a gun to our head and threaten to leave and take the economy with them. The gobbletygook about priming the economic pump is bologna. We pay the bill and someone else gets the profits. ...GoodBye stick and ball guys.
 
I can watch a game from home. No parking problems, expensive/lousy vendor food, drunks and other unwanted problems.

Who cares where the team calls home.
 
+1 good!!!!! I'm tired of seeing this legalized extortion from pro sports. But in any event, they may want to wait until they don't suck before they start asking for money.
 
That is fantastic. I wish i could say the same for our slithering slugs (politicians).
 
Take them to Indianapolis. The suckers there will increase their sales tax to pay for it to affirm their commitment to having sports teams
smile.gif
 
The next chairman will join the rest of the rest of the board, line their pockets and [censored] the taxpayers..very sad.
 
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There is no pragmatic argument to be made for baseball, or any sport. It does not drive economic growth, educate people, save lives, help the environment, et cetera. All it does is shift money around the economy but inexorably towards the owners - ticketholders' money, taxpayers' money, and corporate money, all going to the owners. It's preposterous that any municipality would prop up or subsidize a sports venture, and it's sad that this rejection is so unusual.
 
I'm pretty sure the Business Model for a sports franchise goes something like this:
To avoid taxes, buy a Sports Franchise.
Operate the franchise in such a way that you lose, on paper, money.
Use the loss to offset taxes on your "real" business.
Sit on the team for however long your world allows.
During the time you own the team, and losing money each year, your equity increases as a simple function of owning a sports franchise.
The added value of your franchise is basically a different form of Gold Bouillon. In other words, if you need cash for any reason, borrow against the value of the team, which should be increasing at a rate exceeding inflation.
Sell some day, if you must, but ideally don't. The tax implications of your death may force the heirs to sell. Let 'em, you are beyond caring since you are beyond this world.

So, a key component of all this is to lose money and by indicating how much you are losing while you own this civic asset out of the goodness of your own heart, get others to pay for improvements like the stadium.
 
I normally don't agree with you Ethan1 on many issues however, on this I certainly do. You hit this nail right on the head with your analysis here.
 
I hope they don't get a dime. Arizona has some of the worst education in the country, let them try to use some of that money on something else than baseball.

The Diamondbacks suck anyways, maybe they should build a better team, get more people to go to their games, and then they can pay for it themselves.
 
Originally Posted By: jimbrewer
Well, let me make it unanimous. Not often you see enlightened political leadership coming out of Arizona.
The same could be said of New Mexico.
 
I agree with Maricopa County's Board.

I can't wait till Americans finally stop putting 'pro athletes' on a pedestal and paying them like they
were important. I wouldn't give $20 to watch a pro basketball, baseball or football game live because they are mostly overpaid JERKS with a sense of self-importance rivaled only by politicians...

If we paid chemists, physicists, scientists etc...(the really important and UNDERPAID people) the way we paid these jerks we might actually find a cure for cancer etc...
 
Many mid-sized cities consider a major league sports franchise both an important marker of the success of their regions as well as an important source of local business activity and income.
Whether this thinking is objectively valid or not I have no idea.
Does anyone have knowledge of any credible academic studies showing that it was worth it for Cincinnati to build two new stadiums to keep both MLB and NFL teams, or for Cleveland to keep their MLB team and win a new NFL team after the original Browns, renamed, moved to Baltimore?
It may be that borrowing money to build or improve major league sports venues is money well spent, or it could be that the same funds could have been used in infrastructure improvements and business development with a far greater return. The land used, particularly the huge parking that's little used on anything other than game days, represents an opportunity cost that might be more profitably developed.
As of now, I don't think we know. I'd love to see some studies done by reputable academic economists detailing the economic impact versus the cost of building sports venues and their associated road, parking and utilities infrastructure.
 
I was happy when the Houston Oilers left because the City an County would not pay for a new stadium, then just a few years later the same City and County pay a lot more the get a new team. I voted against every stadium proposal that has come to vote, but they eventually win. I would love to have a business that you can get somebody else to buy you place of business, pay for utilities for it, yet you get to keep the profits of ticket sales, concessions and merchandise.

I agree with you pbm, the money spent on sports and the athletes is just insane. Getting paid millions to play a game is just asinine. It is worse that the public supports it. Unfortunately, it starts in high school around here.
 
So let the teams move on to sucker some other city. Just a few years back the Saints owner (who appears to have more money than god!) pulled this stunt with the state government which denied building a new stadium but did agree to refurbish the Louisiana Superdome (built circa 1972) at a cost of several millions and other goodies. Meanwhile, back at the local school board a fiscal battle was on to refurbish several school buildings within the City of New Orleans to repair leaky roofs that actually caused large areas of ceiling tiles to fall into classrooms. For the most part, "let them eat cake" was the general response to both the schools and the Saints!
 
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