Tag: Wall Street Journal

Stadium

Cincinnati Bengals officials tell the county that their current stadium lease is perfect and that the public loves it too

Hamilton county agreed to “guarantee 50,000 tickets sold per game”, agreed to give the Cincinnati Bengals all stadium management rights, agreed to give the team all advertising revenues, agreed to give the team all money made from food or beverages and agreed to pay for all stadium maintenance or capital projects. But best of all, the county agreed to give the Bengals a state-of-the-art provision that essentially allowed the Bengals to go to the county every off-season and demand the best and most expensive upgrades. That is not an exaggeration. The actual lease said that the county “must install…

William Neilson Jr.
Stadium

Ohio State Politician slips in language to a bill at 1am so that the Bengals can save almost $10 million dollars in taxes

The new stadium has brought virtually nothing economically back to the city and therefore the stadium debt continues to account for more than almost 20% of Hamilton County's yearly budget. Did I mention that the lease agreement says that the stadium must be in a state-of-the-art condition? This means that every few years, Mike Brown will demand any number of new toys for his stadium, like a new scoreboard, and taxpayers are mandated to pay for them. Whenever this subject gets brought up, the team blames the county for trying “to hold somebody else responsible” for the agreement. Classy.…

William Neilson Jr.