Stadium News & Spectulation: "We're gonna need a bigger thread"

Discussion in 'D.C. United' started by NattyBo, Oct 5, 2012.

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  1. greekchampion04

    greekchampion04 Member+

    Apr 2, 2006
    Richmond, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    as far as i can remember... this is what we asked for before mayor gray ********ed us on poplar point
     
  2. song219

    song219 BigSoccer Supporter

    Apr 5, 2004
    La Norte
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    Vanuatu
    ????
    Gray didn't become mayor until 2011. Poplar Point was ********ed well before then.
     
  3. greekchampion04

    greekchampion04 Member+

    Apr 2, 2006
    Richmond, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    they are all the same to me
     
  4. sitruc

    sitruc Member+

    Jul 25, 2006
    Virginia
    [​IMG]
     
  5. The Cold Sea

    The Cold Sea Señor Mejor

    Feb 17, 2005
    The District
    Club:
    Chelsea FC
    Nat'l Team:
    --other--
    No we didn't. But the Post spun it that way, not once but twice. David Nakamura and Marc Fisher worked as hard as they could to kill Poplar Point, Nakamura's argument when confronted was that infrastructure work was the same as paying for the stadium. Of course, Poplar Point died because Fenty wanted his cronies to be the master developers. By the way, how does Poplar Point look today? And then came the PG debacle where one protester at the announcement news conference got like four paragraphs in a nine paragraph story in the Post.
     
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  6. Eastern Bear

    Eastern Bear Member+

    Feb 27, 1999
    Great Falls, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    The same Nakamura who was exposed by the City Paper as a shill for the Fenty administration.
     
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  7. Stan Collins

    Stan Collins Member+

    Feb 26, 1999
    Silver Spring, MD
    The same Fisher went on either Colbert or Stewart to debate against soccer's legitimacy as a sport in America. And it was one of those "joking, but not really" things.

    To be fair to the District, though, the infrastructure costs for developing a soccer stadium or anything else at Poplar Point were astronomical, and the idea only works if a large proportion of the plot gets developed in a short amount of time. Because of the Great Recession, if it had been built, it probably would have been a disaster.

    Also, while Victor MacFarlane did propose to pay for land, nowhere that I know of was it ever disclosed how much he was proposing to pay, or if it was anywhere near enough to actually make it worthwhile. (And again, in hindsight, if he had proposed to pay market value or anything close, he'd have gone bankrupt and the city would still have wound up stiffed.)
     
  8. The Cold Sea

    The Cold Sea Señor Mejor

    Feb 17, 2005
    The District
    Club:
    Chelsea FC
    Nat'l Team:
    --other--
    Yes indeed. He was calling the Fenty Administration "we" in emails to his chief of staff. BTW, he still works at the Post.
     
  9. NattyBo

    NattyBo Member+

    Apr 30, 2004
    Nunya
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    --other--
    Unreal
     
  10. Ourblackandred

    Jun 29, 2010
    Athens, Ohio
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I am not quite sure what's worse: D.C. Politics or Southwest VA backwoods politics.
     
  11. asitis

    asitis Member+

    Mar 30, 2005
    Charlottesville
    Ahh, come on. Staunton is not Southwest Virginia. It's in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley.;)

    asitis
     
  12. Potowmack

    Potowmack Member+

    Apr 2, 2010
    Washington, DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    They're surprisingly similar. DC is still a small Southern town, in some ways.
     
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  13. roadkit

    roadkit Greetings from the Fringe of Obscurity

    Jul 2, 2003
    Fornax Cluster
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I think it's a fair argument to say that since there are more home games in a baseball season, and more tickets sold overall for baseball (I'm completely pulling that out of my ass, but my guess is it's true - at least for this past season), that the economic impact is greater.

    Unless they are talking about the impact of actually building the stadium in which case I agree with you.
     
  14. nobletea

    nobletea Moderator
    Staff Member

    Sep 29, 2004
    HarCo
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Sadly, this happens all the time. Newspaper person needs a story and the politician has one to sell. It's a match made in heaven. Only we naively assume the newspaper person is objective and came up with the story all on their own, because they are so talented and professional. When in reality, some staff person called them up and gave them a "scoop" on the story they want to put out there.

    Massive collusion. Move along, nothing to see here.
     
  15. Bootsy Collins

    Bootsy Collins Player of the Year

    Oct 18, 2004
    Capitol Hill
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Hmmm. That description of the relationship between an organization, a reporter, and a reporter's stories seems familiar to me.
     
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  16. Stan Collins

    Stan Collins Member+

    Feb 26, 1999
    Silver Spring, MD
    Personally, I kinda doubt it. I think it was more garden variety sensationalism. Newspapers are about selling newspapers. But a big pricetag somewhere near a stadium without explaining how they relate, you generate sticker shock. Generate sticker shock, you provoke anger. Anger sells newspapers.

    The City Paper stories on Nakamura also smelled sensationalistic to me. I think it's true that the administration fed Nakamura a line on Poplar Point and that he was only to happy to run with it without any skepticism, for sure, but I think that's because he knew it was juicier than a truth that would have been difficult to impossible to track down, and would read as 'weaker' even when he did. But basically the same thing was done with the Nakamura story from the way I read it (which is why the Post wasn't embarrassed enough to bury him for a while on an obscure beat, instead giving him national politics, which is essentially a promotion at the Post).

    The PG County tale, though, came off to me as a political hit.
     
  17. uniteo

    uniteo Member+

    Sep 2, 2000
    Rockville, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    we tried that in the 70's

    somebody else's turn
     
  18. YellowSpine

    YellowSpine Member

    May 7, 2009
    Portsmouth, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Stuff like this doesn't help. Just happened to see when I was reading this article.

    Although maybe this can just be another reason to hate the Pink Cows for being dead beats.

    9. Harrison, N.J.
    > Credit Rating: Ba2
    > 2011 general fund revenue: $36.8 million
    > 2011 general fund debt: $113.8 million
    > Median income: $51,193

    In 2006, Harrison guaranteed $39.4 million in bonds to buy land for the Red Bull Arena, the stadium used by the New York Red Bulls. The deal has not been profitable for Harrison. Condominium developments, expected to help pay off the stadium, were not finished as of last June. Additionally, for several years the Red Bulls refused to pay property taxes. In July, the franchise paid the town $5.6 million in overdue taxes after a judge ruled the arena was taxable. In late 2011 the state of New Jersey created a $1 million reserve fund to help pay off the city’s debt. Since last October, the town’s credit rating[​IMG] has improved from Ba3 with a negative outlook to Ba2 with a positive outlook.
    http://247wallst.com/2012/10/25/thirteen-american-cities-going-broke/2/
     
  19. Stan Collins

    Stan Collins Member+

    Feb 26, 1999
    Silver Spring, MD
    It's unfortunate that this kind of publicity gets out there, because it's missing some important parts of the situation:
    The "Condominium developments, expected to help pay off the stadium" bit is inaccurate, because the Red Bulls paid for the stadium itself. The government paid for land acquisition, but they also paid for land acquisition for the condos. The city would actually be better off at the moment (if/when the real estate market returns, that may change) if they had done only the land for the stadium. The biggest cost was a parking lot that is mostly about the PATH train, it's just that the stadium provides a certain number of extra parkers for it.

    As to the property tax, what seems to have happened there is that the city, when it got into a financial pinch, went back and re-valued the property (which in this case doesn't include the land, since the Red Bulls don't own it, only the structure that sits on it) at more than it originally was, the Red Bulls disputed it, and withheld payment pending the dispute.

    Essentially, Harrison went nearly broke on a real estate deal, as many cities have during the recession. The only part of that deal that did materialize was the stadium.
     
  20. Liam O'Malley

    Liam O'Malley Member

    Feb 27, 2011
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    So does anyone have any thoughts about if / how the DC elections yesterday might affect Buzzard Point moving forward?
     
  21. nobletea

    nobletea Moderator
    Staff Member

    Sep 29, 2004
    HarCo
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Money is still green, right?
     
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  22. DecadeOfDCU26

    DecadeOfDCU26 Member+

    May 2, 2007
    DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Quote from MLS.com preview of tonight's match

     
  23. Untroubled by Reason

    Dec 5, 2007
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
  24. uniteo

    uniteo Member+

    Sep 2, 2000
    Rockville, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Note to stadium designers...

    heated field.
     
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  25. Heist

    Heist Member+

    Jun 15, 2001
    Virginia
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Or a few more shovels...
    Or if you can't do that, make sure to have MLSHQ in your back pocket.
     

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