Category: Stadium

Stadium

More fake love for Jacksonville’s stadium proposal, this time coming from Jax Chamber

Today, I saw am opinion piece that declared how great the new Jacksonville Jaguars proposal would be for the city and state of Florida. David Miller stated in the Florida Times-Union that this deal would, in fact, be a “catalyst” for “significant and lasting benefits to our community”. Miller goes on to say that this plan would also “revitalize” the stadium, be a “landmark investment” for the city, is “vital” to addressing the “most pressing issues” faced by residents. What can this proposal not do, exactly? Miller points out towards the end of his love letter that he is…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

The Carolina Panthers want $800 million from taxpayers, seem to be using the playbook from their last failed deal

In late 2018, David Tepper bought the Carolina Panthers. His first big project was to build a brand new team headquarters and training camp in Rock Hill, South Carolina. The $800 million deal was announced in 2019 and gave the team an absurd amount of tax credits and property tax savings. As ESPN put it, South Carolina leaders “cheered the investment, offering incentives and relishing getting a piece of the NFL team”. After construction of the project started, it wasn't that long before Rock Hill and Tepper began arguing over funding issues. Following that, Tepper's company stopped working on…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Cincinnati Bengals seem perplexed why local residents didn’t want to give them $300 million for stadium fixes, even after the team said they would give just $50 million

The Cincinnati Bengals are frustrated with Hamilton County on the lack of progress with lease negotiations. The Bengals need to sign a new lease rather soon because their current one runs through 2026. The Cincinnati Enquirer got emails between the team and city showing how displeased both were with the other side. The team believes that there may not be any “political will for any deal” according to their Vice President. They point out how the city gave the team just $39 million for repairs to the stadium when the team wanted $300 million for upgrades. The Bengals said…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Applied Analysis claims Las Vegas saw a $1 billion economic impact from the Super Bowl

But maybe some readers aren't concerned about his unbelievable conflict of interest issues. Let's get to his actual past predictions. Months ago, Applied Analysis claimed in a report that the A’s could draw close to 400,000 new visitors to Las Vegas each year. A number of outlets looked into this claim and universally found that the A's have almost no chance of coming anywhere close to 400,000 yearly. Hell, some doubt they could produce half of that per year.

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Detroit City FC continue pushing for a new stadium, yet give almost no details about the project

Ok, but is Detroit City FC going to ask the city or state to give any money for this project? This will be “finalized in the coming months”. In the last few weeks, DCFC leaders have publicly claimed that when it comes to taxpayer money, the team “will be civic with how they finance the stadium” and will not be “asking for a large sum of public money to fund it”. They will be needing something from taxpayers. Since the team is likely going to use the city's Community Benefits Ordinance process for building the stadium, this means that…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Rhode Island taxpayers are now paying off $130+ million in debt payments for their soccer stadium

When the new stadium was first announced in 2019, the state of Rhode Island would give $27 million to the developers for development of housing units around the stadium. The stadium developer claimed that the cost of the project would be just over $80 million. But after some time passed, the developers claimed that construction costs were too high and that the deal wouldn't work. The Governor cast a tiebreaker vote to allow the taxpayers' costs to shift from housing to the stadium. At this time, the State expected the project to cost $59 million over 20 years, annual…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

After being told that a Final Four would bring trillions to the area, the city of Glendale accepts that they made almost nothing off it

Last year, Glendale, Arizona was told that it could make $270 million dollars in economic impact from hosting a Final Four event in 2024. This year, some groups mentioned the possibility of the state making an impact between $250-$300 million from the Final Four. Others believed it was possibly for the state to bring in over $400 million dollars. The 2017 Final Four in Arizona brought the state $324.5 million dollars of economic benefits. Where did that money go?

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Negotiations continue to happen in secret across the country, all without the public seeing or hearing about it

This is not going to shock anyone. Sports owners hate when their plans are released and looked at intensively. Have you ever read a sports venue agreement? Try reading the Potomac Yard Economic and Fiscal Impact Study from the failed Capitals/Wizards to Alexandria, Virginia proposal. The agreements are almost impossible to read and understand unless you read these types of documents daily. This is why billionaire owners aren’t always forthcoming with initial sports venue details. A professor of sports management was a bit more straight-forward when talking about taxpayers being left out of the venue negotiations by stating that…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Minnesota United FC had grand plans outside their new stadium in 2016. Now? Not so much

Fans coming to the stadium for this year's Minnesota United FC home opener found “very little changed” from past years. Additionally, the stadium was still surrounded by a “barren landscape of surface parking lots”. This is likely why fans continue coming to games and complaining about the “lack of activities around the stadium for before and after games”.

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

The Buffalo Bills promised fans that their PSL’s would “never” price fans out, yet they are doing exactly that

The owners of the Buffalo Bills have a net worth of almost $6 billion. Think about that for a second. Since buying the team, the Pegulas have made almost $300 million from operating income, all the while the team's value continues to skyrocket. Why are taxpayers giving them a single dime? Why on earth are taxpayers giving them $850 million of their money yet also being asked for ridiculous payments just to try to buy game day tickets?

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Former San Diego councilman talked to city leaders about a sports arena. Forgot to mention being a paid consultant for the project.

The group selected to do the project, Midway Rising, promised the city of San Diego that nearly 2,000 of the housing units were going to be given to low-income affordable housing residents. This promise of helping low-income people served as “the basis for the team’s selection” by the city. Unfortunately, several months after being given the project, Midway Rising decided that 250+ of these units and the hotel itself were going to cost them too much. So, they scrapped those projects. Then last month, Byron Wear was sitting in front of the city council for the fourth time, pushing…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

St. Louis MLS owners required no “direct taxes” in 2019…now they are increasing the sales tax rate to 12.7%

The ownership group of St. Louis FC is increasing the sales tax rate to almost 13%. If the city board approves a new sales tax district near the stadium, then the sales tax rate will increase 1% because the team was recently forced to pay “extraordinary costs” to fix their field. The stadium land contained “contaminated groundwater” that was quite a pain to fix and replace. The team claims to have numerous and expensive costs to fix the field. Yet, they have not been asked to detail any of the expenses. So the public has no clue what the…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

The World Cup is going to make everyone billions and billions of dollars

Mexico, the United States, and Canada will jointly host the 2026 World Cup. As the event approaches, cities are getting prepared for the upcoming games. It is rather surprising to see how different cities are reacting to the World Cup approaching. Some cities are outraged at the rising costs, some cities are falling in love with their economic impact projections, and some are just happy to have the games coming to their city. Unfortunately, some cities now realize that the expense of staging these games can massively outweigh the so-called benefits. Most leaders in host cities do not fully…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Can we give a round of applause to the Buffalo Stadium Community Inclusion Task Force?

When the Stadium Community Inclusion Task Force started, numerous local businesses mentioned to them that they were concerned about the construction companies' previous outreach, confused about the application website, and worried about how cumbersome the prequalification process would be. In addition to addressing the above issues, the task force still had to elect a chairman, draft a letter asking for the latest minority business numbers, and review a draft proposal on best practices to include small businesses in the development phase of the stadium. Right before the first meeting was scheduled to be held, several citizens and businesses told…

William Neilson Jr.