NY Times: Stadium Boom Deepens Municipal Woes

The Blue Jackets have been leading discussions on a plan in which the state would grant Franklin County commissioners the authority to impose or put on the ballot an increase in alcohol and tobacco sales. Money from those additional “sin taxes” would be used to finance a county purchase of the arena, which is owned by a partnership between Nationwide Arena and Dispatch Printing Co.
The commissioners said they are against imposing such a tax and need more information from the Blue Jackets on what exactly is being proposed.

The owners of the money-losing Columbus Blue Jackets want a tax increase on beer, wine, liquor and cigarettes to underwrite a county takeover of the arena where they play, defying the will of local voters who repeatedly rejected public financing of the center.

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If you really wanna risk annoying him—and I’m not saying you should—try asking why we don’t just try to buy part of the team instead of the arena. Seems just as appropriate, if not more so.

Do you all have questions for me to ask? Anything you’d like to hear straight from the horse’s mouth? ;)

I still think Nationwide and the Blue Jackets can and should work it out. I just think they don’t want to because they’d rather get saved by the county. Especially right now, the county should put its foot down.

I don’t want to lose the Blue Jackets, but I have no faith that the county can make money on the arena where Nationwide/The Dispatch have failed (unless they can possibly buy it at a bargain basement price). Should Franklin County really subsidize the team more than $10 Million per year ($80 M over the last seven years)?  Still sounds like a bad idea to me.

Team officials say the Blue Jackets have lost $80 million the past seven years and that their lease with Nationwide Arena is a big cause of that. Are we really prepared to let this continue and eventually see the team move to Kansas City? And if it did, what kind of economic impact would that have on the city? How would it affect restaurants, hotels, bars, stores, etc., and those who work there? What would happen to the Arena District if the arena didn’t have a major tenant?

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With regard to taxes on cigarettes and alcohol and whatnot, joev is right. The public health costs are huge and far outweigh the taxes. Taxing so much that there are black markets is overkill and counterproductive. Short of that, sin taxes are rarely too high.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_elasticity_of_demand

Have the government bail/buy you out.
Everyone is doing it!

Don’t worry where the money is coming, its……ooooo look, shiny tin foil, I mean Chinese water dog….what were we talking about?
Oh yeah, Change
Change is good

alison wrote >>
But… the Jackets don’t *own* Nationwide Arena, do they? My understanding is they just have a cushy rental deal.
And how many times did the voters say they don’t want a municipally owned arena?
(Didn’t see this post and started another — sorry hegemo)

Jackets are far from having a cushy rental deal. They get nothing from the naming rights of the arena, very few (if any) dollars from parking and barely any money from suite sales. The Jackets are hoping Nationwide will sell the arena and then re-invest the money to become a minority owner of the team.

This is happening because the tax payers voted down a tax to build the arena.