Skip to main content

A Little Too Ambitious--"Real"ly?


Mayor Peter Corroon and the Salt Lake County Council can wipe out a fairly big mistake if they act on the study recently conducted regarding building a new soccer stadium. The study indicates that Real Salt Lake's plan is too ambitious, and there will not be enough money to pay for the project even in the best of scenarios.

I once served on a city council, where we had a large development group approach us with plans for a wonderful development of commerce, golf courses, gated communities, and everything else they could think of. But we had to act fast, because if we didn't they would go somewhere else. Against my wishes, we acted fast, and luckily our town didn't get stuck with any of the bill except our city's credit rating has now become suspect. There are a few homes now (6 years later) in the once-promised shangrila.

This is why I see Dave Checketts' and Real Salt Lake's proposal for a new stadium in Sandy as a dangerous undertaking for MOST of those involved. It ain't gonna work. And Dave Checketts WILL NOT be left holding the bag. Can you guess who will?

Here's what they want:
  1. $30 million in hotel tax revenue from the county
  2. $15 million in redevelopment money from Sandy City
  3. $29 ticket prices
  4. 12 packed concerts per year in the new stadium
  5. Dipping into rosily-projected Major League Soccer profit sharing revenues
And after all this, a study by Economics Research Associates projects that there will not be enough revenue to fund the debt. I can only assume that this takes into account the highway robbery that Real allowed DC United to get away with when it acquired Freddy Adu.




Land developers aren't the only ones famed for producing unscrupulous economic projections. Sports franchises do, too.

City and county officials will have their decision as early as Monday (Jan 22, 2007). I certainly hope they decide to be as circumspect with public monies as I'm sure they are with their own.
Labels:

Comments

  1. Scott Hinrichs1/22/2007 09:50:00 AM

    Years ago my parents taught me that when it comes to major financial decisions to back away if pressure is applied to do it right now. The sales folks are skilled at making it sound so urgent. I can still remember my mom saying, "If it's a good deal, it will still be around after you've had time to think clearly about it." Dad also counseled that if a deal is so hot that it evaporates while you're taking your time considering it, something else will likely come along. I still think that's good advice.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Thank you for commenting. If you have a Google/Blogger account, to be apprised of ongoing comment activity on this article, please click the "Subscribe" link below.

Popular posts from this blog

School Vouchers: "The Bramble Memo"

$429 million? What? Where? The legislative fiscal analyst for the State of Utah calculated the costs to the public schools over the next 13 years if school vouchers are implemented. It said the costs would be $5.5M in the first year, and $71M in the 13th year. Suddenly, the number I have started seeing thrown around was $429 million, the total costs for vouchers over 13 years. Where did that number come from? Enter the mysterious "Bramble Memo". In the past few days several of us (Jeremy, Utah Taxpayer, Craig, Sara, Urban Koda, Jesse, and me) have (sometimes?) enjoyed a lively discussion about school vouchers in Utah . Jeremy clarified to me the costs of the venture by linking to a copy of the Utah Legislative Fiscal Analyst's Impartial Analysis (LFA) of the costs of Vouchers , found on "The Senate Site". In my previous voucher article, I quoted some of Lavar Webb's article from last Sunday's Deseret News, wherein he stated that those total costs ...
66 comments
Read more

The Inhumanity of Bob Lonsberry: Waterboarding, Concentration Camps, and the the Bataan Death March

KNRS 570 radio talk show host Bob Lonsberry advocated waterboarding and other forms of torture during his show on April 21, 2009. More grotesquely, he was beaming with pride about his advocacy campaign. It's difficult to imagine then, that, by the same rationale, had Lonsberry been a German at the time of Hitler, or a Japanese during the Bataan Death March, that he would not have advocated torture of Jews in the concentration camps or the bayoneting and shooting of American soldiers on the Bataan trail. Torture, Torture, Everywhere! Nearly 80,000 American soldiers were captured by the Japanese in the To contemplate a discussion about whether or not torture is legal or whether it even works, it is first required to come to the conclusion that 'I am a child of God, but my adversary is a monkey'. Phillipines in 1942 and forced to march with no food and very little water for six days. If a man stumbled, if he didn't respond quickly to a command, or if he tried to get wat...
50 comments
Read more

Amazing Grace: Why Do So Many Mormons Not Get It?

Note on Comments for This Post: Somehow, blogger is displaying about 3 fewer comments than have actually been entered. I have added 3 comments, so that the last relevant ones will be shown. In addition, I have closed comments on this article. Please click on this link to continue commenting on the original article . Sorry for the inconvenience. In large part because of the many childish and tyrannical things we do to each other (and to ourselves), life sometimes seems to suck. God, however, did not intend it to be that way. Unfortunately, our worst tormentor is often ourselves. We Mormons mentally flagellate ourselves on a regular basis. God especially did not intend it to be this way. Instead, he hopes that we will look upward and see the Amazing Grace that he gives to us. We're so busy with the seeming enjoyment of miring ourselves in guilt, however, that we seldom even notice that his grace is at our fingertips. Amazing grace How sweet the sound That saved a wretch l...
44 comments
Read more