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News & ArtsMonday, October 15, 2012
Politics / City / News / Sports King County Council Passes Sodo Arena Memorandum of Understanding 9-0
Posted by Goldy on Mon, Oct 15, 2012 at 3:11 PM
Or so says Cienna from across the room. She's listening in to the City Council debate the revised-revised MOU; a vote is expected shortly.
UPDATE: The Seattle City Council just voted to approve it 7-2, with Richard Conlin and Nick Licata voting no.
2
Someone tell me if I got this right:
Seattle pays up front for: environmental study, hooking up some utilities, administrative costs till now on the vote.
Hansen & co pay up front for: the land, permits, taxes, acquiring the Sonics and the NHL team, moving all that, and initiating construction of the stadiums.
Once all that is locked in, Seattle cashes in around $250,000,000 of our bonding capacity--NOT cash on hand. We throw this into the pot for the stadium.
Stadium is built, Sonics return after nearly 10+ years, NHL returns after 80+ years.
Hansen & co own the Sonics and NHL team, and the land, and that's it. They are legally barred from moving the teams out of Seattle for at least 30 years.
Seattle owns the stadium and leases it back to Hansen & co for a profit. Seattle pockets all taxes and fees from the stadium. Any events that happen when there is no NHL or NBA (boat shows, conventions, whatever) are pure profit for the city. Once the $250 million bonding capacity pays itself back off of these fees, anything we get is pure profit for the city.
Am I getting anything wrong here?
Seattle pays up front for: environmental study, hooking up some utilities, administrative costs till now on the vote.
Hansen & co pay up front for: the land, permits, taxes, acquiring the Sonics and the NHL team, moving all that, and initiating construction of the stadiums.
Once all that is locked in, Seattle cashes in around $250,000,000 of our bonding capacity--NOT cash on hand. We throw this into the pot for the stadium.
Stadium is built, Sonics return after nearly 10+ years, NHL returns after 80+ years.
Hansen & co own the Sonics and NHL team, and the land, and that's it. They are legally barred from moving the teams out of Seattle for at least 30 years.
Seattle owns the stadium and leases it back to Hansen & co for a profit. Seattle pockets all taxes and fees from the stadium. Any events that happen when there is no NHL or NBA (boat shows, conventions, whatever) are pure profit for the city. Once the $250 million bonding capacity pays itself back off of these fees, anything we get is pure profit for the city.
Am I getting anything wrong here?
3
Hansen has no interest in owning an NHL team. Another party or parties will seek to purchase an NHL team then presumably make a deal with Hansen over the terms of the lease.
7
#2 sounds good to me, but what you did not mention is any law is open to interpretation and hence that means if Hansen want's out, for what ever reason, he pulls out, heads out of town and waits for the law suits (tax payer funded law suits on the part of the city) to hit the fan. He settles for something like a payment of 2 million dollars to the city and the city and the tax paying citizens are left with a HUGE WHITE ELEPHANT no one can afford. Seattle citizens are then stuck with a HUGE bill to be paid. That's what you left out which is sort of wrong of you to do, but I forgive you.
8
@7 All you have to do, when you're a Corporation, is just declare Bankruptcy.
Just saying.
Just ask Tully's.
Just saying.
Just ask Tully's.
11
Thanks, city council. Now I will have a clear conscience when I vote against every single levy from now on, no matter what it's for.
12
#6
Found out what? That the only way to have a championship NBA team is with the Tacoma Dome.
This plan is stupid and wasteful. We have a stadium the same size with a transit station. Amtrak, local LINK and Sounder all stop there. It has adequate parking.
We could be having an NBA team this year...this season...just by bootstrapping with Tacoma Dome.
Instead we got sold out by the politicians, especially the "King County" Council (why do they even fake representing all of King County...they're basically just the same old Seattle Libs times 2) who couldn't take 2 seconds to think of regional instead of Seattle centric solution.
Found out what? That the only way to have a championship NBA team is with the Tacoma Dome.
This plan is stupid and wasteful. We have a stadium the same size with a transit station. Amtrak, local LINK and Sounder all stop there. It has adequate parking.
We could be having an NBA team this year...this season...just by bootstrapping with Tacoma Dome.
Instead we got sold out by the politicians, especially the "King County" Council (why do they even fake representing all of King County...they're basically just the same old Seattle Libs times 2) who couldn't take 2 seconds to think of regional instead of Seattle centric solution.
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