urbanSTL

Northside Neighbor wrote:

One question I had was never asked -- Any normal business would just expand when it wanted to serve a new market. Stan would never decide to build a new Walmart in one market, and burn another one to the ground in another market where sales were still good. So why doesn't the NFL just EXPAND to LA, as if they were a business not protected from anti-trust laws, and stop putting loyal fans in three cities through this farce? But nobody asked that one.

^ That is a GREAT question.

More teams means the pot is split by more owners. It also dilutes the quality of the product on the field.

Reading through this thread I see multiple mentions of "St. Louis is a sports town -- we don't have much else." I hate this narrative because frankly it is untrue. I am pro-task force and pro-riverfront stadium because I love sports including football and believe it is an integral part of being a "world class city" in the bigger picture. However, if the Rams and NFL leave (which I don't want them to) we will be fine. We will lose another feather in our cap and a potential BILLION dollar investment in the City, but we are resilient and other positive projects, i.e. Cortex will push us forward.

There are so many things that make St. Louis great beyond sports. We shouldn't pigeon-hole ourselves as a "Sports-town". I spend a large portion of my career traveling through other mid-sized cities and we have so much more to offer than them due to our rich cultural, economic, and architectural history and as a major city. I bristle when St. Louis-ians sell our great city short.

^ Thank you for bringing this up. Nothing else to do in StL Waaaaht?

^^When referring to us as a sports town, that just means we love our sports, which we do. I do not think that label, would give anyone the perception that sports is the only game in town and only think we do or cherish. We are a beer town, a town with great history, a music town, a great architectural town… I could go on and on. I just think that says we love our sports (which we do) amongst other things.

roger wyoming II wrote:People like Randy Karreker are so wrapped up into this emotionally that they can't see straight; their lives revolve around sports and that's fine, but the NFL just isn't that important to the well-being of large cities and regions in the scheme of things.

I hate this statement. Don't belittle people because they show passion in something. These people (including myself which was at the event last night) are no different then all of us. This forum shows the same passion, as an example, when it comes to SLU for turning down different buildings in STL. Most people won't understand that fight either. But don't belittle them just because they think differently about one issue. Respect their passion and move on.

Regarding the “NFL town hall meeting” , I was there. I was amazed when I walked in the doors of the Peabody, to see Eric Grubman standing there greeting people, but nobody really talking to him. That was impressive, even though it was a ‘dog & pony show’ (PS- Grubman hates that term)
Anyhow, I stopped and talked to him. I pleaded our case, gave him all of the facts about our fine city and went through the usual stuff about the bylaws and Stan’s poor product and treatment of the fanbase. He listened with great interest (or so it seemed).
I got a good 10 min. one on one. The most disturbing thing he said to me, was that the St. Louis Riverfront venue, if built today as presented, would fall into a range of 15-32. He basically said the new venue should start at top tier and then go down the list from there. It should not start in the middle of the pack. He based this on its economic impact going forward. I told him that we are in the middle in most categories and it is not surprise that the stadium would fall behind Jerry World, Indy and several others. He then said there are 8 no brainer venues ahead of the proposed STL stadium. Then he claimed that a new STL venue should fall into that next 7 stadiums, not after that. He said he felt ours would fall into the next grouping. I rattled off a bunch of stadiums it would be top, Cincy, Buffalo, JAX, etc. etc.. He did not disagree. He was very friendly and even said hi to me by name, the 2nd time I approached him. I immediately reported my findings to Howard Balzer and he questioned Grubman on his comments he made to “a fan”. You can listen to Howard’s question to Grubman on the info I got out of him. Listen at about 2:45.

mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/kwmu/files/201510/GRUBMANSCRUM.mp3 …

or go to Jason Rosenbaum's twitter, down to his tweet from last night, regarding the after town hall press conference

https://twitter.com/jrosenbaum?ref_src= ... r%5Eauthor

All in all, it was a fun event to attend. Very passionate people, minus the annoying protestors that showed up. They were booed out of the building, since this was not the place or time. While I agree, probably will not move the needle for the owners, it was cool to see so many STL’ers united against the NFL’s greed. Our fanbase looked good IMO. Randy Karraker was great! I think he was almost brought to tears as he got into his 3 minute speak.

^ i said this on the last page of this. he was talking about revenue..or at least thats what he said he meant.

i think he said in terms of revenue it would be 15-20...which is perfectly fine for the size of the market.

listen starting at about 3:15
http://mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/ ... NSCRUM.mp3

he said strictly from $ side...but seems like it can be improved by upping suite prices and premium ticket prices ect

At $1 billion this would be the 6-8th most expensive stadium in the NFL

Lets say that its #19 in terms of revenue....Are the 13 owners & their stadiums that are behind it really going to say...hey now thats not right this stadium should be producing more for Stan....doubtful.

roger wyoming II wrote:People like Randy Karreker are so wrapped up into this emotionally that they can't see straight; their lives revolve around sports and that's fine, but the NFL just isn't that important to the well-being of large cities and regions in the scheme of things.

I tweeted these sentiments before and during the hearing, but I'll reiterate them here.

In my opinion, last night shouldn't have been a pep rally, and it shouldn't have been commentary on the worthiness of spending our tax dollars on a stadium (unless directed towards the NFL essentially requiring it).

It did become a pep rally. And a couple times the taxes were campaigned for, which was unfortunate. Another time they were referred to negatively, although it was as much directed towards the NFL as anything. Unfortunately the crowd embarrassingly started shouting over this speaker. Then a mini protest ("fund schools, not football") cropped up and was also shouted down.

The point being those things did come into play—but they were thankfully rare.

This was about defending ourselves to the NFL, and that was largely done in the right way. And Randy Karraker was very much apart of that. He was the PERFECT speaker for this setting.

Now, for the reasons you mention (some of which are what made him the perfect speaker for this setting), he would be the WORST speaker in front of the Board of Alderman. He's simply out of touch with the facts and the city. He has and no doubt will continue to run his mouth on the airwaves about that side of things. It's unfortunate because he's wrong but will find many followers.

But last night he was brilliant. It was the right context for his passion, and I believe I agreed with everything he said.

My own $0.02: If you don't live in the city of St. Louis then you have no right to get mad at the BOA for wanting a public vote or to even try to sway their decision.

Thank you for making that point.

And I'd bet the audience last night was easy 90% non-city residents.

Northside Neighbor wrote:
And I'd bet the audience last night was easy 90% non-city residents.

but last night wasn't about if the city residents should vote or if BOA should approve the city funding...It was about keeping the Rams in the St.Louis region, not how that's accomplished

My problem with people insisting on the "public vote" is that unless that public vote is happening in the next few weeks, it's tantamount to killing the stadium proposal and thus the NFL in St. Louis.

The stadium financial assistance public vote ordinance has been dead for months. During these months, Green, Ogilvie, Spencer, Ingrassia, or any of the other of the handful of aldermen/alderwomen who are transparently against financing the stadium that would keep the NFL here no matter what could have introduced a bill requiring a public vote, but of course they waited until the zero hour to do so in order to ensure it would kill the NFL in St. Louis, if it were passed.

Your two cents should actually read "If you don't live in the city of St. Louis then you have no right to get mad at the BOA for wanting to remove the NFL from St. Louis or to even try to sway their decision."

Which is perfectly valid. Just own it.

I am a City resident, by the way. I don't know why I felt the need to qualify my post with that........ but, there it is.

Agreed with most of you.

Just because other people have made us politically disconnected doesn't mean we always have to act that way. With that said, there also needs to be some recognition of the system we have and respect for the entity to which you don't explicitly belong.

So if you live in the county and want to see this thing built, there's 2 things you should do in my opinion.

1. Contact your county representatives. Ask them why they're not involved and encourage them to get involved. For the same reason it's okay for county residents to contact city officials, the county SHOULD be involved. We need to do more to act as one, and right now the county isn't fulfilling that. If you're a county resident and you don't first press your representatives on that, you're not being fair to anyone.

2. Be upfront about who you are and respect the concerns of those closer to the situation. You can have an opinion on the city if you live in the county and vice-versa. But respect that people who live in the city understandably have more on the line for developments happening there and that they very possibly have a better understanding of the impacts. If you're going to express your opinion to officials that don't specifically serve you, make it a point to be educated about what you're saying.

I don't think most people contacting the city Board of Alderman are fulfilling either of those suggestions. And that's disappointing.

jstriebel wrote:

Mound City wrote:My problem with people insisting on the "public vote" is that unless that public vote is happening in the next few weeks, it's tantamount to killing the stadium proposal and thus the NFL in St. Louis.

The stadium financial assistance public vote ordinance has been dead for months. During these months, Green, Ogilvie, Spencer, Ingrassia, or any of the other of the handful of aldermen/alderwomen who are transparently against financing the stadium that would keep the NFL here no matter what could have introduced a bill requiring a public vote, but of course they waited until the zero hour to do so in order to ensure it would kill the NFL in St. Louis, if it were passed.

I think only your first sentence here is valid. At this moment in time, passing something that requires a public vote would kill the stadium plan. It's a fair point.

But that lawsuit that throughout the ordinance wasn't filed until June and wasn't ruled on until August.

And the Task Force could have kept the Board of Alderman in the loop at any point to keep them updated on the financing plan and try to get their approval. But they waited. And waited. And waited. And finally some of the BoA had to do something to try to protect the public from having one pulled over them at the last minute.

And what do you know, once the bill was filed, the Task Force finally released some details to the BoA.

If the BoA moves forward with the public voting bill, then yes, I'll be a bit upset because they know very well that at this point in time it would unequivocally kill the plan without room for negotiation.

BUT, I'll still be more upset at the Task Force for so blatantly deciding to by pass the public from the very get go. They never wanted to give anyone else input and sought to minimize the input of the BoA as well. This is on them.

And the hero worship of Peacock and Blitz last night was not something I liked seeing.

I'm not here to have an ethics debate about what the Task Force did. They've only done everything they think they have to do to fulfill their task, which is to secure the NFL in St. Louis. Reasonable people can take issue with their methods, and I have no problem with you doing so.

The lawsuit was actually filed in April, and it was ruled on at the very beginning of August. As we are now at the very end of October, it's been months, specifically about three months, that the public vote ordinance has been dead. It does not matter at all what the details of the proposal are, if this were really about a public vote, the aforementioned alderpersons could have introduced a public vote bill at any point from the time they have been in session until now.

Introducing it now and passing it unequivocally means killing the NFL in St. Louis (again, unless that vote were to take place in the next few weeks).

Which, if that's what you want, then fine. But own it.

Enough with this "public vote" crap.

I think you may be conflating some people's priorities here. I don't think the Aldermen are seeking to kill the NFL in St. Louis.

I think they simply have principles that they hold higher than NFL football in St. Louis. And they're willing to sacrifice the NFL in their fight for those principles.

I agree they should be upfront about the fact that they will indeed BE sacrificing the NFL in that quest. But I think it's wrong to suggest they're simply out to kill the stadium.

Rather, they're willing to kill the stadium in order to promote their principles of public votes and fiscally responsibility.

jstriebel wrote:I think you may be conflating some people's priorities here. I don't think the Aldermen are seeking to kill the NFL in St. Louis.

I think they simply have principles that they hold higher than NFL football in St. Louis. And they're willing to sacrifice the NFL in their fight for those principles.

I agree they should be upfront about the fact that they will indeed BE sacrificing the NFL in that quest. But I think it's wrong to suggest they're simply out to kill the stadium.

Rather than willing to kill the stadium in order to promote their principles of public votes and fiscally responsibility.

Killing the NFL in St. Louis = Killing the NFL in St. Louis. Whether you're working to do so in service to your principle against publicly financing pro sports facilities, or your principle in favor of public votes, or your principle in favor of "fiscal responsibility," you are doing the same thing.

Own it.

I said it earlier in this thread: it's highly insulting to our collective intelligence when Megan-Ellyia Green tweets that she's a "Rams fan" and blogs that the Rams are "entrenched in our region's identity and should remain so for generations" on the same day that she announces she'll introduce a bill that will effectively kill any possibility that the Rams remain in St. Louis.

I can't tell you what to be insulted by and what not to. But I'm a diehard fan, I promise you. But there are principles upon which I'm okay giving up the NFL. That doesn't make my statement about being a diehard fan a lie.

I agree that killing it is killing it. But killing it to kill it IS different from killing it because you value other priorities more.