A Win-Win Proposal
King County executive Ron Sims says he’s met with local investors interested in keeping an NBA franchise in Seattle, but it probably won’t be the SuperSonics.
Sims doubts the city will be able to stop owner Clay Bennett from moving the team to Oklahoma City and a spokesman says the team is not for sale.
Sims told The Seattle Times the city may be able to hold onto the name Sonics, which could apply to an incoming franchise. He says two of three potential investors in a new team are interested in building a privately financed arena and the third wants to refurbish Key Arena.
NBA owners vote at their April 17-18 meeting on the Sonics’ petition to move. Trial is set for June 16th in Seattle on the city’s lawsuit to force the team to play in Key Arena for the two seasons remaining on the lease.
I like this proposal a lot. The majority of Seattle taxpayers object to paying for a new or refurbished arena for the Sonics, having been pushed (even after voting no multiple times) to finance new stadiums for the Seahawks and the Mariners. Private investors will be vital to having a pro-basketball team in Seattle.
(Disclosure: I am unable to find a copy of the article online. It was printed in the Saturday edition of The Oregonian.)
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The Seattle Post-Intelligencer quoted unidentified sources as saying the local investors would contribute $150 million toward a $300 million overhaul of KeyArena. According to those same sources, the proposal envisions that existing stadium taxes would be extended to raise another $75 million and the city of Seattle would contribute the remaining $75 million.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2004250855_apwasonicsfranchise.html
It’s a cool idea, but the NBA is not going to expand in the US. Overseas, perhaps, but with the Sonics about to become the 2nd team in he last few years to ditch one big city for another (Charlotte’s Hornets ran to New Orleans a few years back, which led to the dubious decision to award Charlotte the last expansion franchise, their Bobcats, a couple years later), and some of the lower-end markets struggling to fill seats at arenas, the NBA realizes the US market is all but tapped out.
If the Sonics leave, Seattle is not going to see another NBA team for quite some time, if ever again. I’m on the fence whether or not this is a good or bad thing, mainly given the declining quality of the NBA product over the past 10-15 years.
" having been pushed (even after voting no multiple times) to finance new stadiums for the Seahawks and the Mariners."
I keep seeing people say this, but didn’t the Seahawks stadium get approved in a public vote?
Litlnemo, no. The voters said no on multiple ballots but Paul Allen and the Seattle City Council went ahead with it anyway. The Mariner’s stadium though, I believe was approved.
Voters approved Qwest Field in a state-wide ballot measure; they voted against Safeco Field before the state legislature approved funding during a special session.
Yes, Ryan is right. The Seahawks stadium was approved; if you broke out the Seattle voting totals, it might have been that *Seattle* voters didn’t like it, but it was a state-wide vote.
The tax plan to support Safeco Field was voted down. The legislature came up with a different tax plan, so you *could* say they didn’t override us there either. But they didn’t put that new plan up to a vote, so who knows how it would have gone.
The "we voted down the Seahawks AND Mariners" meme is pretty common around here, though.
I did not specify that we voted down the Seahawks AND Mariners. That is where the confusion lies. I should have been more clear in the post, but I wrote that the taxpayers were pushed into financing both stadiums.