Vikings Stadium Legislation/Financing Package

[ECtransplant]

Excuse me, but it should be heavy rail subways built underground through uptown

[twincitizen]

Lengthy article about how Oakland is firing cops but still paying for the Raiders: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-2 ... tain.story

[Nick]

I mean, the team is called the Raiders...it's right there in the name. At least the Vikings don't have any history of pillaging or anything.

[Nick]

http://www.startribune.com/local/minnea ... 20531.html

And here's a more local experience:

Hennepin County taxpayers on track to pay ballpark off early

Unlike the home team, Hennepin County's financing plan for Target Field is exceeding expectations.

Taking advantage of a stable revenue stream and low interest rates, the county has prepaid $31.3 million of variable-rate debt on the downtown ballpark, including an $11.4 million payment made earlier this month.

"The bottom line is promises made, promises kept," Minnesota Ballpark Authority executive director Dan Kenney said Friday. "We said this deal would work, and it has."

The excess payments made so far will save the county $53.7 million in interest expenses.

[...]

For Target Field, Hennepin County's initial plan was to make the final debt payment in 2037, but the payoff now could come five or 10 years sooner, according to county Budget and Finance Director Dave Lawless.

[...]

Obviously there's no such thing as a good long term projection, but I have a gut feeling that Minneapolis is going to continue to do well over the next couple decades.

[Nick]

http://minnesota.publicradio.org/displa ... ab-revenue

So basically we all need to start playing pulltabs, pronto.

[mplsjaromir]

I'd laugh if wasn't so sad. This deal totally sucked.

[LRV Op Dude]

Vikings, MN Lawmakers React to Stadium Deal in Atlanta

The Atlanta Falcons are being required to pay $800 million of a new $1 billion NFL stadium. The Falcons will also kick in an extra $50 million for infrastructure improvements.

[RailBaronYarr]

To anyone saying it 'couldn't be done' without so much public financing... there you go. The VIkings can also now shut their mouths when they claim they're making the largest investment in joint-venture (public/private) NFL stadium history or whatever their claim was (which is asinine given inflation, the relative number of roofed facilities gone up in the last 20 years, etc).

Sigh.

[MNdible]

I'm not saying that the Vikings deal was better than the Falcons deal, but I will say that the devil is in the details. Often times, the top line number gets dwarfed by costs and responsibilities in the out years. In addition, local economies and stadium elements included or excluded can make it very difficult to get an apples-to-apples comparison.

[mattaudio]

I don't think it's necessary for an apples-to-apples comparison if it's obvious they're both rotten... I won't bite!

[mnmike]

Just a random question...are the Falcons worth more than the Vikings? If so then it would make sense that they would pay more...just wondering if the teams are similar financially.

[Le Sueur]

I would also agree making this apples to apples is not worth it. But in case your Google is broken here is what Forbes has to say about NFL Team values as of August 2012. If you subtract the 22% bump the team got after the stadium deal, the Vikings are dead last in Value and Revenue on this list.

[HoratioRincewind]

This is one I've been happy to have been on the right side of for a while.

The Vikings weren't going to go to Los Angeles.
*The NFL gets $1,000,000,000 for an expansion franchise
*The NFL gets $250,000,000 for a relocation fee
*There is no place for them to play in Los Angeles
*If you think that MPLS politics are messed-up, go west young urbanites. Multiple (privately funded) stadiums have died an ignoble death in LA.

This is a terrible deal for Minneapolis, even more so than for the state. Where will the city of Minneapolis get the money to subsidize the Convention Center when the revenue stream is going to pay for the stadium?

Both of them are terrible money pits that municipalities should avoid like the plague, but, push comes to shove I think the Convention Center results in more incremental and unique dollars being spent in the region. The Stadium has 10 games, 70,000 seats, 700,000 total tickets. I'll ball park it as 500,000 individual game goers-- many of whom are from the state of Minnesota and many from the region. Some people will get a meal in Minneapolis for the game, but just as many will come and go with a cooler of food and beer. The Convention Center brings in thousands of people a weekend who spend a lot more dollars. The financial wizardry of moving the Target Center off of the property tax rolls was supposed free up the money to direct toward the Convention Center (and remodeling the Target Center), but this is all in the ether.

The city also abdicated any real critical negotiating position with the Vikings and the NFL. Even if you accept that ultimately the financials of it were just a foregone conclusion the city could still find marginal changes about parking and other land use factors to make it work to compliment the city more.

[Rich]

I agree that Minneapolis bears far too much of the financial burden, and that the economics of sports facilities is messed up. But let's not underestimate how useful this building will be.

There will be WAY more than 10 games. College baseball alone should account for around 150 games. There will also be small college and high school soccer and football, and almost certainly MLS. All told there will likely be more games played at the new stadium than in any large facility in North America. It'll host huge concert tours, truck-pulls and other motor sports, community events, religious gatherings, conventions and so on. There will be Super Bowls, Final Fours and Big Ten Championships. There will be a Vikings Hall of Fame. Plus, 30,000-40,000 folks will use the building to run or rollerblade every year.

One other thing. An increasing percentage of attendees will arrive via transit. That, coupled with the inevitable switch from surface lots to ramps, will reduce the number of tailgaters down to a handful. Almost everyone will in fact be purchasing their refreshments on site (to the delight of Zygi).

[mattaudio]

Yes, but the fact remains that the only reason why there was the political will to override the wishes of Minneapolis and likely most of the state was because of the threat of losing the Vikes. We wouldn't be spending hundreds of millions of dollars for any of those uses if they were unbundled.

[HoratioRincewind]

There will be WAY more than 10 games. College baseball alone should account for around 150 games. There will also be small college and high school soccer and football, and almost certainly MLS.

All of which except for the MLS could be played in the Dome, in a smaller baseball stadium like the new Saints stadium, or Target field, or at facilities at the University.

All told there will likely be more games played at the new stadium than in any large facility in North America.

As they say on the interwebs *CITATION NEEDED*

It'll host huge concert tours, truck-pulls and other motor sports, community events, religious gatherings, conventions and so on. There will be Super Bowls, Final Fours and Big Ten Championships. There will be a Vikings Hall of Fame.

Still don't see how any of these aren't all possibilities at other facilities, or why they are inherently good things that we should want regularly or at all(the Superb Owl for instance). I don't care about the Vikings Hall of Fame, and I really don't care about it when I think about the public subsidy for it.

Plus, 30,000-40,000 folks will use the building to run or rollerblade every year.

Again, *CITATION NEEDED* because I'll bet dollars to doughnuts that there are 1000 folks who use the concourses of the Metrodome to rollerblade 30 or 40 times a year. And, say this out loud, and slowly if necessary: "The state of Minnesota and the city of Minneapolis will spend over a billion dollars to give a marginal number of people an indoor rollerskating rink." It sounds obviously dumb.

One other thing. An increasing percentage of attendees will arrive via transit. That, coupled with the inevitable switch from surface lots to ramps, will reduce the number of tailgaters down to a handful. Almost everyone will in fact be purchasing their refreshments on site (to the delight of Zygi).

This doesn't acknowledge the (I think) 5000 parking spots that Zygi negotiated the right to build and charge for-- parking spots that already exist downtown in very close proximity to the Dome and new stadium which would benefit the city of Minneapolis. As well, while I like transit usage and want to promote it, this comment neither really promotes transit usage, or the public benefit of subsidizing a billionaire New Jersey real estate mogul.

[mplsjaromir]

We all got super hosed on this deal. Zygi is laughing at us right now from his penthouse over looking Central Park.

[mattaudio]

There's a moment of sheer panic when I realize that Paul Allen's apartment overlooks the park... and is obviously more expensive than mine.

[Rich]

All 150 of those local college games will be played in February and March. So there's literally no place they can go other than the new stadium. Regarding citations, I'll gladly concede the point about number of games if anyone can name a place with more than 25,000 seats that'll host more contests. Lastly, the number of people who skate and/or run is listed at the dome's website. To be clear I should've said "30,000 visits" and not "30,000 folks." But does it matter whether one guy goes 30 times or 30 guys go once? The amount of use the building gets is the same.

Look, I completely agree that the way it all went down, and the effed up way in which buildings like these are financed, is far from ideal. We coulda kept the Metrodome. We shoulda drove a harder bargain. We did indeed get hosed, and yes, Zygi is laughing. But hey, we'll get 'em next time right? What's done is done. At the end of the day there will be a beautiful new asset bringing millions of people downtown for decades to come.

[Viktor Vaughn]

Not ideal? We got hosed, but whatever? What's done is done, at the end of the day we'll paying for this for decades to come?

I realy don't understand people's attitude about this stadium. Minnesota could have made a stand against this billionaire extortion with very little risk of losing that shitty team. Instead we just gave in to it while acknowledging we're getting played like tools.

But whatever. Now we can go back to pretending we're broke in the face of public spending priorities. We can pretend giving food to hungry people creates a moral hazard while hundreds of millions in giveaways to so-called capitalist is just fine. We'll get em next time!

How stupid do you loyal fans feel now that you know loyalty is a one-way street? Do you even care?