Minnesota Vikings owners Zygi and Mark Wilf today said the team is breaking off relations with the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission until the commission loosens the purse strings in its Metrodome lease and helps it build a new stadium in downtown Minneapolis.
In a blistering letter sent this afternoon to Paul Thatcher, chairman of the commission’s Finance Committee, the Wilfs said they were “shocked, exasperated and extremely disappointed” by the committee’s proposal Tuesday to encourage the team to extend its Metrodome lease by two years.
The resolution, which will be on the full commission’s agenda Thursday, proposes awarding the team all post-season stadium revenues if they agree to a lease extension.
If the team refuses, the resolution proposes to start collecting $4 million a year from the Vikings — rent that it has forgiven the team since 2002 in an effort to help it stay competitive with better-positioned NFL teams.
Memo to the Sports Facilities Commission: you can’t negotiate if you don’t have leverage and the Vikings are holding all the cards. They have the country’s second largest media market and a brand new stadium waiting for them in L.A. There is ZERO chance that they will renew their lease and everybody knows it. So why on Earth would you attempt a stupid stunt like this? All you are going to do is push them into Ed Roski’s arms.
If anyone at the MSFC really thought that threatening the Vikings would persuade them to renew their lease, they should find a new line of work. I am honestly just astounded at the sheer stupidity of this move.
Absolutely correct Zach. I'm sure the politicians will start screaming about no money for pro sports teams, but how about…for once..they all shut up and get the job done.?
Good bye, take the Twins, Wild, Timberwolves and Guthrie to LA with ya. They are all useless wastes of resources.
How 'bout you go to LA instead?
How about you pay for your own entertainment.
For once, KH, I agree with you.
F#ck the Wilfs. We hold one BIG card. Just look at what happened with the North Stars. A few years without hockey, and we get another team.
Just keep the name, if possible.
Sweat God, I'm agreeing with KH….
Pass around the plate. I'll throw a few bucks in to keep the Vikings in town. I love having that team here.
I love the Twins too and am beginning to love the Wild. The T-Wolves? They can go.
"Pass around the plate"
They're called taxes. I'm sure you'll be wild about paying more of them.
No, taxes are involuntary, unless they are a user tax of some sort.
With "passing around plate", we are free to choose. And I would choose to pony up a fair amount to keep that team in town.
Hey Zygi, don't let the door hit you on the way out. Take that carpetbagger Favre with you. Don't come crying back to us when LA slides into the ocean, burns down in a gigantic wildfire, and your team is 0-16.
Except what will really happen is the Vikings will probably double in value in LA and Zygi will sell the team in ten years for a massive, massive profit.
Seriously. Fuck welfare for billionaires.
Actually, this is an argument to build the stadium now. Norm Green was looking for less than $100 million to pay for a new North Stars stadium. We ended up paying hundreds of millions more to secure the Wild and build the X. If you want football in Minnesota, keeping the Vikings is WAY cheaper than waiting for another team.
I don't think an argument for wasting money now is that we might be presented with the chance to waste even more money later. The fact is that there is no good evidence that these expenditures provide a commensurate return. We would be better off fighting to make these types of projects illegal so the teams are forced to pay their own way regardless of where they locate.
As our country circles the drain, I suppose there's nothing more
important than where a bunch of over-grown, over-paid
sports celebrities call home.
Bread and circuses.
What's a billion dollars now days? Chicken change!
ttp://www.radiumforums.com/showthread.php?t=29090 Buy VIAGRA only $0.84. CIALIS only $1.45
I am just curious to how much that "fair amount" is. Because the stadium is going to cost almost a billion dollars.
Stupid idea. Would. not. work.
Let's see…. there are 5 million people in Minnesota. Let's say 1/2 of them are taxpayers.
Of the 2.5 million, it would take each person paying about $300 to build a new stadium (assuming the public finances about 75% of it). It could be financed, let's say over 10 years, so $40 per year when you add some interest.
But I don't like making everyone pay. KH doesn't want to pay, and neither does justinph. To make them pay is simply falling back on our draconian taxing approach. They shouldn't have to — they don't want a stadium.
But I do, and I'll pay. Let's say I'll pay $100 a year for 10 years, or my "share" plus KH's, because I love the Vikings so much. Let's have a checkoff on the tax form where can voluntarily contribute. We are free to choose. Everyone wins. I feel good that I keep the vikings. I'm not pissing and moaning about the govt taking my $1,000 - I chose to send it it. It is a great thing.
I don't want to pay for an individual's health care who chooses to live off the government and does not even attempt to support themselves. Or, for someone who shouldn't even be in this country. Could we have a check off for that too? Which brings me back to a recent point. Those who favor higher taxes and government controlled everything should be willing to pay more than me. But they don't. They want my money also. Thus, I don't think your plan will build a new stadium. The one thing we know (I think it's been proven), is that we will spend more to bring a team back after we lose the one we have.
I reject the idea that I even have a "share" that needs to be picked up by somebody else.
I can understand why somebody would argue that education, health-care, shelter, food and even transportation are items that should be provided at some minimal level to everybody with public funding. The idea that the same argument can be made to subsidize an endeavor so unnecessary as professional entertainment is ridiculous. The fact we might be increasing the tax level of a productive entity like Medtronic while pissing away money on something as unproductive as a stadium is almost too absurd to be an article in The Onion.
If the stadium costs a billion dollars ($1,000,000,000), and your fair amount is $1,000, that means that a million taxpayers will need to voluntarily contribute.
I would recommend spending your money on a new crack pipe.
I said this above, but that is idiotic.
I can always hope. Change and hope. Perhaps this will be the era in whic we move to more of a choice-driven tax system.
I don't want to pay for any roads that help CMan get further than 5 feet from his house. I don't want to pay for any police/fire protection for CMan. I don't want to pay for any national defense that might protect CMan. I don't want to pay for any part of a judicial system that enforces contracts and makes business possible that CMan might use. I don't want to pay for any food safety or product safety that might save CMan or keep his kids from lead toys. Why should I pay for stuff that helps CMan?
What services are you willing to give up CMan? It is always priceless how you whine because you pay for services you think don't help you, but you are never willing to cut services you use. You tell us, if we want higher taxes then we should be the ones to pay for them. I tell you, CMan, if you want less services then you should quit using anything the government provides you.
It is almost a leadpipe cinch that I pay more in taxes than you do.
I oppose additional taxation for the stadium, though.
Agreed. But there IS an impact to the community and the state once the Vikings pull up stakes and leave. They always try to do a study on the impact a team has, but it becomes slanted to the politics of the interested party. Still, I don't think most people factor in the up side to what the economics of having the team means to Minnesota.
Look, I'm not one to defend stadium subsidies — I agree with you mostly — but I do think you're drastically oversimplifying the issues at play here. It's very difficult to quantify the benefits of what you categorize as "professional entertainment." For example, grants to the Guthrie don't just support the Guthrie but lead to articles in national papers about our theater scene, attract residents, bring commerce to areas of the city that may not otherwise see it, expose generations of people to thoughts and ideas they may otherwise be deprived of, etc…
Now, do the benefits add up to the cost? That's a very tough question, but I would assert that our state actually provides a very modest, reasonable amount of money to the arts and an exorbitant amount to professional sports. The simple reason is that the latter are much more popular, but I think the intangible benefits are much more limited. And then there's the BIG difference that the Guthrie, Art Museum, Walker, etc…, are all non-profit whereas the Vikings are very much for profit.
Again, this is not to say that I would oppose a wholesale exit from any public funding for private entertainment, but just note that it's much more complicated than you characterize.
By the way, they tried this in Green Bay. In the late 90s the Packers put up $80 million worth of stock for sale at $200 per share. They raised $24 million dollars.
Here's the deal: without a taxpayer funded stadium, the Vikings are leaving. That's not a threat, that's a reality. There is no other way.
I am resigned to the fact we will pay for a stadium, and love the Vikes. But in all honesty, we don't need any "studies". Iowa, as boring as it may be, has seemed to survive with zero pro sports teams. We would survive. We would ust be boring.
The key assumption that is always made in those impact studies is how much of a shifting effect there is. How the authors treat that one assumption will determine the outcome of th study.
If they assume that someone who spends $100 on football would have spent that same $100 on dinner out or a show if football had not been an option, then there is little impact to having a team in town.
If they assume that the people who spend $100 on football came from out of town just for that game, or would not have put that money into the economy in another instance, there is a net benefit.
It is only complicated if you are trying to justify spending tangible resources on things with nonexistent or intangible benefits. To justify spending on any of the things you mention you need to do more than simply show the benefit is greater than the cost. You need to show that the benefit is more than it would be if the resources had been spent in other areas. Does a billion on a stadium or a hundred million on new arts facilities provide a greater return than spending those amounts on education or health care? The fact that it is complex and hard to know is not good enough asking to spend other people money.
The fact that every level of government seems open to the extortion of the type being used by the Vikings is the core issue. We should not allow any government at any level to subsidize any business either directly through projects like the Guthrie and stadiums or by providing special tax incentives such as TIF. Remove those tools and all of the issues around needing to "articles in national papers about our theater scene, attract residents". It isn't a governments job to attract residents. It is to manage the public functions for the residents who choose to live there.
Is there a doctor in the house? I think we should get Alec's blood pressure checked. For the record, I don't want my tax dollars going to a new stadium. I pay taxes, am happy to pay taxes at a reasonable rate, and know that government is a necessity to provide certain services. I do not buy into socialism light which requires that 80% of what I earn will be confiscated by an out of control government. Yes, I am of the belief that if some degenerate who has figured out the system to live off the government when he/she is an able bodied soul(there are many), that I should not have to pay that persons way. And, in case you want to know why we have those individuals amongst us, it is because we have created them with entitlement programs since the New Deal era. As for a new stadium, smarter folks than I will have to figure out the pros and cons of taxpayer money to subsidize rich owners. OK Alec, deep breath in….slowly let it out as you count to three. Repeat.
Does that make it better or worse than the stupid idea of a tax funded stadium that does get implemented?
All I know is that I want the Vikings to stay and I am willing to pay for it.
That's where you are wrong, because the $1,000 you are willing to contribute is nothing. Unless you favor taxpayer funding, you are indifferent to the team leaving.
Then support user fees. That's the only fair way to publically finance this stuff. I've never understood why Arne, Jesse, and Tim were all so radically opposed to this idea.
I do favor taxpayer funding. Voluntary taxpayer funding. Taxpayer funding doesn't have to always be the tired old formula of passing a program and then paying for it through progressive income taxes, or as Milton Friedman put it (I paraphase), one group of people spending the money of another group of people on a program to benefit yet another group of people.
A use tax, like Pete suggests below, makes perfect sense. Make those who spend money on entertainment, especially those who spend money on sports, fund this stadium. Make it a targeted tax, and target me! I'm willing to pay it!
If I could buy into the stadium with my little piece of equity in an effort to get this done, I would. But that isn't how these things typically work.
The money spent is not added to the economy when it is spent. It would exist just as much sitting in a bank because it can then be lent out. Money can only represent work already done because the only things that can be consumed have already been produced. A football stadium may act as an economic aggregator in that it focuses spending in one area, making it easier to observe which in turn creates the illusion of a benefit.
The truth is it simply funnels resources into the hands of the team owners allowing them to take a cut. The designs of the new stadiums are completely focused on capturing revenue inside the parks. They are competitors of local businesses, not draws for them. The new Yankee stadium is killing local business who was told all along that they would see thousands of potential customers every time there was a game so the project. The stadium was designed to funnel people directly from transit hubs, into the park which would provide the fans with everything they need, and then funnel them right back into their cars or trains. No fuss, no muss, and not a drop of money wasted outside the stadium and captured by the team. Remind you of a new ballpark we have downtown now?
The same sales pitch will happen here and like it has always been in the past it will be complete BS, every word.