sirshankalot wrote:For young urbanists who think sports aren't important why does this thread have 190 pages?
At 42 I don't exactly consider myself young but thanks. Apparently I am to agree that it's a great idea to:
1. Creatively finance this behemoth with no wiggle room in the budget in case things don't end up as rosy as predicted.
2. Tear down most of the few remaining historic buildings in the north riverfront and be thankful that we got more parking lots instead of sustainable development.
3. Enable the NFL and their franchise owners to pit urban areas against each other and profit from a game of extortion.
4. Do it all for a game that (along with boxing) causes cumulative traumatic brain injury and risks the mental health of players.
Thinking otherwise is unreasonable, obstructionist and probably downright un-patriotic.
As for this thread having 190 pages. I would guess this is one of a handful of sports related threads on UrbanSTL and the attention is focused rather than divided between 500 different discussions.
Ok here is a legit funding question. Dome gets paid off in 2021 so $6M from County and $6M from city and $12M from State will no longer be needed to pay off dome bonds. City $6M and state $12M will be extended to pay for new stadium. Stenger says County hotel tax will be extended, and will be applied to the Convention Center. So that will be new money the Convention Center did not previously have. So why doesn't the City reduce its funding of the Convention Center by $6M?
I've got a couple years yet. I didn't remember the question about age, but I just checked Oakland and San Diego's link, and it appears age was NOT asked.
Interesting that both of those cities have yet to close registration. When I heard the report yesterday that St. Louis had enough demand to close registration, but San Diego and Oakland didn't I thought it was nice but maybe not that big a deal if we beat those markets by a day.
But we're now looking at 2 days, and they're reportedly only letting about 1,500 people into these hearings. So it's definitely interesting that these other cities haven't filled theirs.
That 1,500 number kind of stinks for St. Louis. It's reportedly because the venues in the other two cities only hold about that many, so they're keeping it even. But the Peabody holds over 3,000, and so now it's going to appear half empty.
It's the height of naivete if you think this "public hearing" means anything. The only thing that matters is whether STL can show the NFL the money. And even then there's a hardly a guarantee STL keeps the NFL.
Here's what I'd like to see. Vote or no vote, STL shows the money. The hard money. The real, we have the funding right now and it's in the bank money. It's sitting in an account with the NFL as joint signer. All of it. It's theirs. We shovel hundreds of millions to the rich clubby members of the NFL with their hookers and big cigars. Done deal.
And then despite all of that, just like the organized crime syndicate they are, the NFL says, "Sorry, not enough! Too late! You lose! You get NOTHING!!" Willie Wonka style. Game over.
And then you know what we do? We sue. STL sues every last one of them. Every team owner voting against STL. Goodell. Goodell's stooge, Eric "shrinking timeline" Grubman. The advertisers. Kroenke. The Rams. The moving companies. The equipment manager. All of them. For $ Ten billion. Here's your $billion, and we raise you $ TEN BILLION.
We sue them for breach of contract. Detrimental reliance. Violation of federal anti-trust law. Collusion and illegal business practices. Extortion. And for just wasting our friggin' time. We seek punitive damages so they never pull this crap again. We tell them all to go to hell and that we'll see them in court.
Well put. I agree completely. I don't even think we need a new stadium yet, and I believe Kroenke agrees. But per anti-trust exempt NFL rules, we have to build, or show we would build, a new stadium to satisfy the NFLs own relocation rules to keep our team. So we shouldn't get too wrapped around the axle about pledging funds now, since even if the NFL follows its rules and stops Kroenke, it could be another 10 years before a new stadium is actually built. But we will keep the Rams and force the NFL to pay for half of the cost eventually.
legally, I don't know why I couldn't make the case that I purchased my PSL and season tickets years ago with the assumption that the NFL would follow its own relocation rules, and my loyalty could be rewarded with a winning season here someday. If they break their relo rules, would a judge rule that the NFL should refund all my costs for breaking the implied and written contract?
^ I agree its likely there won't be a stadium built here for at least a few more years even if the Rams stay. There's the NFL process and then there is the Kroenke process.
Also, the more I'm looking at this thing the more concerning it may be about The Grub's comments about the Naming Rights Bond Proceeds -- I think under his worldview this would reduce the public share to under half... roughly from a 55% public share to a 47.5% share. If the NFL insists those $75 million in funds are NFL $$ that may allow the league to say the public isn't bringing enough to the table.
I got a pass for tomorrow. While I'm not expecting to speak and agree that this is nothing more than a dog & pony show, if the opportunity comes, I will take it.
Anyhow, it is surprising that several of us on here, got passes, when only 1500 people get in. You'd think with media and season ticket holders, there wouldn't be much left.
Regarding the public contribution, isn't the city refunding the money back to the team through game day revenue tax that will be initially bonded out naming rights money?
I think part of the defensive attitude from the naming rights deal from the NFL is they're upset that it is progressing as well as it is in STL; or at least making it more difficult for them to choose. Not that our efforts don't have some issues, but compared to SD and Oakland, we're looking more polished despite the hurried timeline.
I also saw through the KTRISTL page that some LA fans successfully obtained passes for tomorrow night by logging in bogus season ticket numbers and I assume zip codes. If true, and the NFL can't even organize an event like this on the up and up, a good question for the panel tomorrow night is how can we have any faith that you can handle a relocation fairly?
My dad (a season ticket holder) and I (not a season ticket holder,yet, hopefully) both got passes and plan on attending.
^The NFL townhall registration required very little info. On the pass, the only info shown is my name, along with a bar code. It says I will need an ID with it. All I had to do was put in a bogus address with my name, then show my ID, regardless of the state. I can't imagine the process being that formal. Since this is nothing more than the NFL filling in a checkmark on their list of bylaws, they probably won't put much into it. I expect Grubman and his crew to dance around the questions, in the most political of ways.
Did a interview with KMOX that was suppose to air this morning on the topic of tomorrows hearing...i hope my seinfeld reference made it.. "you see the cardinals owner chugging a beer with the team while stan probably eats donuts with a knife and a fork"
blzhrpmd2 wrote:Regarding the public contribution, isn't the city refunding the money back to the team through game day revenue tax that will be initially bonded out naming rights money?
I think part of the defensive attitude from the naming rights deal from the NFL is they're upset that it is progressing as well as it is in STL; or at least making it more difficult for them to choose. Not that our efforts don't have some issues, but compared to SD and Oakland, we're looking more polished despite the hurried timeline.
City would pay $210 cumulative on the bonds and redirect an unknown percentage of gameday taxes away from the general fund and towards paying off separate "naming rights bonds" issued by the RSA. With respect to the naming rights bonds, an issue is who gets credit for them... Saint Louis City or the NFL? NFL says them, which has upset Peacock but that reduces the public share that he is trying to bring to the table. Regardless, Saint Louis City residents get screwed.
The issue isn't just that the NFL believes the naming rights money should be theirs. Peacock has actually tried to make good on that by repaying the naming rights money out of the gameday tax revenue.
I suspect the NFL would begrudgingly accept that.
But that's complicated because the NFL believes the gameday tax revenue should ALREADY be their money. So they'd claim that we're paying back their money with their money.
It is an utterly absurd and greedy stance that takes corporate charity to a never before seen level. But they seem very genuine in their stance. Truly disgusting.
jstriebel wrote:The issue isn't just that the NFL believes the naming rights money should be theirs. Peacock has actually tried to make good on that by repaying the naming rights money out of the gameday tax revenue.
I suspect the NFL would begrudgingly accept that.
But that's complicated because the NFL believes the gameday tax revenue should ALREADY be their money. So they'd claim that we're paying back their money with their money.
It is an utterly absurd and greedy stance that takes corporate charity to a never before seen level. But they seem very genuine in their stance. Truly disgusting.
And as you said, St. Louis City gets screwed.
Definitely absurd, and if the NFL ends up rejecting the stadium plan over that, then I hope the task force, local officials, and the media make it absolutely clear why the NFL rejecting St. Louis's bid to build a stadium.
^^ Peacock put the naming rights bond revenue on the public side of the ledger; the NFL wants it on the private. That's important b/c it effects the percentage of public versus private participation and puts the public cost below 50% instead of over 50%. We may or not be saying essentially the same thing, cause its so confusing! Anyway, I think we all agree the NFL is a viper pit demanding all our money!
(I think I mentioned already here but maybe it was on twitter that fans will also be asked to pay for an extra 1% sales tax to pay for a CID or TID that will be created to help pay for the basic maintenance and operations and I believe w/o any NFL $$ participation... I'm unclear on who would be responsible for more major upgrades on new seats. scoreboards, etc. that inevitably will be needed.)
^I'm not sure we're saying the same thing, but we're not disagreeing either. You're basically saying the first part, and I'm saying the second part.
You're right that Peacock is putting the naming rights bonds on the public side and that the NFL disagrees with that. The reason they disagree with that is because they believe those funds should be theirs already.
BUT, Peacock isn't keeping the naming rights funds for himself. He's only leveraging them upfront. The plan actually calls for paying back the NFL that money. And that's where the gameday tax revenues come in. Those revenues are how Peacock intends to pay the NFL back.
But that just creates a FURTHER hang up, because the NFL believes those revenues are their money already too. So as I said, they not only see STL as spending their money up front, but they also see STL as paying the NFL back with the NFL's money.
And as you say, that means that in their mind that money should count towards the private financing side of things.
^ I guess it may be worse than I was originally thinking. Including the second set of bonds + interest, the total amount of the city may be on the hook for could be closer to $400 million than $200 million., with a yet to be determined percentage of gameday taxes generated going back to the general fund.
So instead of essentially paying out $6 million a year and getting back around $4.2 million a year (at the moment), it appears the plan may be to have the city pay closer to $12 million a year and getting perhaps even fewer gameday tax revenue than currently. That is if I'm understanding things right.
^ Looks like our bullsh*t regional politics will cause us to lose the Rams. When will this region wake up and realize that it needs to change. How the hell did the city think it would be able to fund the stadium alone?
I just heard Ray Hartman on Frank Cusumano's radio show. Ray Hartmann has totally bought into Rex Sinquefield's ShowMe Institute's theory that St. Louis and Missouri will not lose ANY tax revenue if the Rams leave, including the $13 million they pay the state in State Income tax. Here is how the theory goes -- We Rams fans won't be able to spend our discretionary entertainment dollars on the Rams anymore, but no problem -- we'll all go downtown and spend the same thousands on other entertainment instead. He said Cardinals, Blues, sodas, food, movies, etc. So the city and state break even on tax money. First of all, the Rams players and staff will be in California, and their tax money is just gone, no matter what. And many Rams fans love football so much, we dig deep to spend a lot more on the NFL than we probably should. If they leave, there is no other entertainment that will spur our passion to spend that many thousands of dollars. I already attend as many Cards games as my schedule allows, and nearly all the games are sold out anyway. So I don't see the Cards getting a huge inflo of Rams fan money. Same with the Blues. Rams fans are not automatically switching to a sport where you can't see the puck. If the Rams leave and Blues and Cards tickets sales do not shoot up, Ray and the Show-me Institute will have some serious explaining to do. And the notion that we'll double the number movies, restaurants, and sodas we buy is just stupid. I am much more likely to spend my former Rams dollars on travel -- possibly to LA to see the Rams, or to Indy or Nashville. NFL Sunday ticket is a possibility -- and that money doesn't stay in MO. Or I'll take an extra trip to Florida or Smoky Mountains and spend some time there. Also, I'll buy myself toys on Amazon, which does not collect state sales tax normally. So Ray's parroting of filthy rich guy Rex Singuefield's Show-Me theory just shows me that Ray must have some other motivation for saying we won't lose tax money. He can't actually believe that drivel. If that were true, it would apply to casinos as well. Might as well get rid of them since people gambling will spend the same amount of money on other entertainment. Or baseball. Who needs it? We'll always have bowling to spend the same amount of entertainment dollars on after all.
