An interesting article that poses an interesting question when public funds are used to build stadiums worth more than the team. (They use DCU as an example). Interesting considering the real value of the majority of MLS teams is less than 150 mil https://sports.vice.com/article/the-radical-case-for-cities-buying-sports-teams-not-sports-stadiums Sorry if posted elsewhere.
No. The writer knows nothing about anything. He's just some untrained local "new media" with a niche following.
I'd like to see cities gain ownership shares in clubs but never controlling shares. That is if the entity invested money in the stadium.
Actually, it might be just the opposite. Why would they build a new stadium when there's already a stadium for [insert NFL/NCAA team here].
Maybe I am missing something here, but, let's say United were bought by D.C., aren't they still in need of a new stadium?? Or would they just be playing at RFK rent-free?
The author goes off on a really weird tangent, but the main point is asking why cities pony up money for what is generally a losing venture for the city when they could buy the club and keep the revenues. What you are bringing up is the main reason it might not work. It would have to be run like a business that uses governmental resources. Which might not happen.
fvck no, this goes totally against the proven business practice or privatizing profits and socializing losses.
Where to begin... 1. Fan associations, supporters trusts, etc., are completely different than government ownership. He's equating the two, and that's stupid. I'm all for fan ownership, because fans actually care about the team. Government would sell the team the second they had a fiscal crisis. 2. Any type of collective ownership really only works when a team is generating a big operating profit. Green Bay, Barcelona, and Bayern Munich all do that. Most MLS teams do not. MLS counts on very rich people constantly spending their money to improve their product in hopes that maybe, some day, they can sell it for a total profit. I can't see a city council approving a budget that includes pouring money into an MLS team for the next 10 years. Etcetera.
In DC's scenario I expect the value would be about even. The District's portion is for the infrastructure, land, and future tax abatements. The club's contribution is about $150 million for the construction.
That's much better than what I was thinking. "What? city workers want a raise? Guess we're raising ticket prices now and you can forget about that new fancy DP."
Haha, like anyone working for the city, state, or federal government has gotten a raise in the past 5 years...
We're running on 6+ now since we've had a raise but the governor is promising to put something like a 3% raise in the budget. Of course, after all the alterations to the proposed budget, it will go down to 1% if we are lucky.
Cities should use eminent domain to buy teams if the team is threatening to move and the demanded subsidy to stay exceeds the value of the team. The leading US Supreme Court case on eminent domain is the Kelo case where the court held that public use is pretty much whatever the government says it is. In that case a city wanted to force a woman to sell her house so they could turn around and flip it to a real estate developer who would privately profit from building an office park. The city's claim was that the greater real estate taxes generated would provide services to all citizens. There was some backlash to the decision with various states passing laws restricting eminent domain. But depending on the state, it may very well be legal to take a sports team that way. Sports leagues hate the idea and usually have partnership terms that prevent publicly owned bodies but those would probably fail an anti-trust challenge if the league tried to force out a publicly owned team. I live in Columbus and am a Packer shareholder just so I can claim to be an NFL owner;-). Our local baseball team the Clippers (Indians AAA club) is owned by the county government and plays in a relatively new county owned stadium. The team operates at a modest profit so there is no annual fight over how much to subsidize it. When the stadium was built a few years ago there were shenanigans in the construction contracts. State law requires using the lowest bidder so various methods were used to disqualify non-union shops and steer the contracts to favored bidders. But that's as much as politics interacts with sports here.
Government running stuff is communism. Government giving stuff to rich people and corporations is capitalism. Stand with capitalists against communists.
Didn't Pittsburgh briefly own the Pirates back in the 80's, or am I misremembering that from my childhood readings of the Sporting News. This would have been before the stadium building boom, but the Pirates were pretty miserable at that point.
In 1984 there was some talk of the state of MD using eminent domain to keep the Baltimore Colts from leaving town. It was along time ago but I believe that is why the Colts snuck out in the middle of the night in the infamous Mayflower trucks in the snow.
I got 4% last year but that was the first 'raise' I had received in 3 years. But I did have a job reclassification in that period that resulted in a ~17% jump. Nevermind that I had been doing the job I got reclassified to for 4 years previous, and did not get back pay.