In a recent statement, county commission candidate Daniella Levine Cava wrote what I had been thinking:
"Why are stadium deals consuming the Miami-Dade County Commission’s time and energy while critical services are placed on the chopping block? Sports are important to our community and economy, and I am glad so many franchises want to call Miami home. But when elected officials spend time considering how much to subsidize sports teams, while police, fire departments and libraries are forced to operate on drastically diminished budgets, we have lost our perspective."There is a sense percolating up from the general silence that passes for daily life in Miami that the David Beckham deal for a soccer stadium in downtown Miami has run into the buzz saw of public opinion. What is rare is that the buzz saw doesn't operate more frequently and that elected officials are so disinclined to pay attention.
13 comments:
There's an old joke about a millionaire sees a couple in the bar and offers the woman a million dollars for one night of passion. The couple is taken back but thinks about it a while and decided they could really use the million and it's only one night.
They say OK but then the millionaire says, I've change my mind how about doing it for a thousand dollars?
The woman says Hell no, what kind of person do you think I am?
He says, we've already establish that, now we're negotiating a price.
So the mayor won't support $300 million for baseball on principle but $41 million tax gift for basketball is a "great deal"?
How do you re-negotiate a bad deal make make it 19 million worst then claim a victory?
Gimenez was doing victory laps before he even started yesterday. It had the same feeling of the Marlins deal..and still holds the same egg-on-his-face future outcome when the Heat starts turning a huge profit making money hand over fist (especially with the new NBA TV contract coming up in 2016) and it turns out a million a year is chump change the profit sharing deal would have paid.
The county once again got screwed simply because they can't see past the next playoff and Mayor fails to understand the concept of agressive forensic accounting.
On the up side this failure should pan out just about the time he's running for re-election.
Daniella is so right on this issue. Of course we like our sports but for Pete's sake pay attention to important quality of life issues FIRST!
Between Gimenez and Robaina: who is the worse crook?
I am thinking Robaina but he might have been the better choice. Too many lobbyists around Gimenez.
Wow. Amazing to see cava concur with Bell. Lynda Bell voted against the Heat crapy deal.
Bell supports this deal all the way. She even complemented the mayor on the negotiations during the vote. She voted "no" strictly for political cover knowing that the Heat already had the nine votes for supermajority.
She said (I paraphrase) I support millionaire sports franchise giveaways but I got this goody two shoes breathing down my neck so got to cover my ass.
A perfect example of how Cava is already having an impact on the BCC.
Commissioners and candidates need to come out and aggressively support Museum Park. If Museum Park gets turned into the latest Bayside Marketplace, what will be next?
Go Daniella! lets get her into office now
Definitely Giménez is the worse choice. Unfortunately many were fooled by his "Wolf in Lamb's Clothing" deception.
His swarm of lobbyists is an embarrassment. They tell him what to do and make his choices for him.
Giménez is not allowed to read this blog. His sycophants delete all negative comments.
Sorry for the double post. Don't know why that happened. Feel free to delete one.
Does Lynda think she is disguising herself by spelling "crappy" incorrectly? She had her nose all the way up the Mayor's ass when she voted NO on the Heat deal without any explanation. She spoke in favor of it..."don't let best get in the way of better" or whatever that stupid phrase is. She almost apologized for voting No. She can try to avoid wedge issues with Daniella Levine Cava (capitalize formal names, Lynda) but her full frontal alliance with Gimenez is undeniable.
Just because the news media here is lathered up with the sport franchise issues doesn't mean that's the only thing happening. There is a lot happening, it just goes unreported because the media is not playing it's role as the 4th estate.
And let's put this into perspective. The Marlins fiasco is going to cost our county 3.2 BILLION dollars.
The heat deal, in present value, adds 6 million for 5 more years on the operation agreement, along with a commitment from the heat to spend at least 81 million dollars to keep the arena in first class condition. That is at least based upon the analysis of an independent engineer. Why? So we don't have to build another stadium in 15, 20 years (see the old dearly departed Miami Arena). Oh, and now the County has a claim on naming right revenue that could add 2 to 3 million back to the county a year starting in 2020.
The Beckham deal would cost the county nothing, and in fact, if they use county owned land, they would have to pay fair market rent, which means geniuses that the county would make money on that deal.
And the dolphins deal that is in the process now would essentially give the dolphins a portion of the cdt and tdt tax that is generated through hosting a large event like a super bowl or college championship. So, no money out of pocket, and there is only a subsidy of the community benefits from a large event that is attracted by the renovated stadium.
So, in sum:
Heat- 6 million more in exchange for 81 million in improvements to our stadium (we do own it afterall)
MlS- no money and revenue if county land used (250 million dollar project paid with private and state money in the form of sales tax rebates).
Dolphins - 400 million in renovations, a couple million here and there only if they can attract events that will generate way more than that under any math for the community.
Total - 731 million in local construction paid by mostly private parties.
Vs Marlins
650 million public cost, with the financing costing even more, 3.2 Billion. County gets nothing back. No large events. Nothing.
It is easy to opine, but, if you do so, try including a few relevant facts.
Facts:
The arena failed because it was too small, had to do market, not condition.
Present value of the the Heat deal is a fixed value joke. Currently the team is worth more than $2 billion based or the last NBA franchise sale.. Just because the county is letting the the franchise bury profits is no reason to take a $200 million profit sharing deal and trade it for a lousy million Especially now...That's pawn shop financing.
And if you couldn't figure out the guys balance sheet before, what make you think you're going to see a square deal from the naming rights?
Sale tax rebates? Not really a lossl? Why do these all the guys get sales tax rebates? Because the bring in new revenue? Isn't that their business model? Why don't we give Mr Jenkins up in Lakeland a sale tax rebate every time he opens a Publix in Miami? He could go elsewhere..
Bed tax isn't really out taxes? Right, and Santa paid for all that stuff he gave your kids last year, didn't come out of your budget cause it was Santa money...
So Anon, your argument boils down to because we were violently dry anal raped by the Marlins we should consider the fact that the Mayor has made a deal with Mickey, Ross and Beckham which they all agree to use lubricated condemns and go slow means this time it's good?
Sorry Mr. Mayor, try putting ANY of your "Best possible deals" to a public vote.. We'll show you how it feels.
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