Roxana Orrell wrote: > A very small number of people attend baseball games - at most 1% of Minnesotans. > Other sports have a bit bigger following, but still around 1% who actually > go to a game at least once every year or two. This means that the rest of Minnesota, > rich and heartbreakingly poor alike (the latter of which WILL NOT be going to > any games!), is being asked to subsidize the fun & games of a very few sports > fans.
This is in a word, incorrect. The Twins drew 1.8 million people to games this past year. The population of the state of Minnesota is 4.3 million. If only 1% of the population attended all the games, each attendee would have had to attend 42 games. I went to six, and no one who went with me to those six games went as often as I did. But let's just say that the average attendee attended six games this year. That means 300,000 different people attended (about 7% of Minnesotans). Now there is plenty of give and take with these numbers, but even if we call it 5% of the state, that is still a higher percentage than just about any other revenue generating (i.e. tax paying) activity in the state. > Others may argue that many more Minnesotans enjoy watching pro sports > on TV, so there is greater state-wide benefit, but this is false logic. The > ONLY appreciable economic benefit to Minnesota from a stadium would come from > fans who happen to come TO the stadium and spend entertainment dollars in the > area...snip...so where's the great pay-off? The Twins are carried on at least a couple dozen radio and TV stations throughout the state (and several more in SD, ND, IA, MT), each of those stations is important to many small businesses in their respective areas that use Twins games to advertise their wares to people in surrounding towns. Local businesses helping each other. It is a relatively small impact, but it does exist. Also, there is a great civic payoff for the many elderly, shut-in, etc. people, statewide, who unfailingly tune in Twins broadcasts. > And who can we ask in good faith to bear the cost? Nobody but the fans. It > is wrong to ask all Minneapolitans to pay for these folks' entertainment, especially > since we also have to bear the additional crime, noise, traffic, and garbage. This is a city. There is always some level of noise and traffic and garbage. As far as crime goes, is there hard data linking sporting events at the dome, and an increase in crime? Just curious. > It is wrong to ask the whole state to provide funding, since most residents > of the state will never travel a hundred or more miles for a game. Roughly 32% of the people in Minnesota live in Hennepin or Ramsey county. I'm guessing the majority of them never travel to any of the outstate state parks, yet every one of us city types pays for the infrastructure and upkeep for those entertainment venues. I suppose it's a hazard of being a part of a community. > A successful entertainment enterprise pays for itself from ticket, souvenir, and > concession revenues. True. Now I want my money back on the new Guthrie project. ;) I am not up for publically funding a stadium for the Twins. Baseball needs to get its financial ducks in a row, and shows no signs of doing so. Most baseball owners can talk the talk but many can't get past their "Got Mine" capitlism mindset to walk the walk necessary to strighten up the economics of their game. If the public builds a percentage of a stadium then it deserves that percentage back in the revenues it generates. Public investment should net public gain. These types of investments don't work that way (just ask our president, whose only successful business venture ever was the profit he made when he sold his share of the Texas Rangers after their value skyrocketed when the public built them a ball park). But, let's also remember that the Twins do have a very viable Minneapolis, as well as a statewide economic impact, to the tune of about $65 million into the public hopper (as an example, every one of those highly/over paid players- 48 roster players times 81 games, pays Minnesota state income tax). If the Twins disappear, jobs will be lost immediately by the Twins' and the Dome's employees, but several Minneapolis folks are looking at job losses down the road as well. For example, Minneapolis hotels will lose 2500-3000 rooms per season, companies that transport the teams to and from the airport/hotel/dome will lose that chunk of business, the companies that sell concessions to the dome for 81 home dates will lose that business, Rent-a-Cops, catereres, charter bus companies, and so on. These companies will have to make up that lost income, and if they can't, people will be out of work.Gray areas abound! As they say, nothing is easy. richard carney st. paul Long time ECCO, Linden Hills, Carag resident _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
