NFL
owners have voted, and the Rams are moving back to Los Angles. Well, not Los Angeles, but Inglewood, in a
privately funded stadium part of a $1.7 billion entertainment complex. Not a built complex, but a proposed one. I wonder how long until the Rams propose a
little public funding for their stadium?
And
where does this leave St. Louis? With an
empty Edward Jones Dome, built with public money to the tune of $300 million
back in 1995, that’s where. Of course,
St. Louis civic leaders and public officials didn’t go down without a
fight. They begged the Rams to go for a
new $1.1 billion private-public riverfront project (home of the River Rats,
maybe?), but to no avail. Nothing like
seeing the leading citizens of your community throw themselves at the feet of
the NFL.
Public
funding for the homes of professional sports’ teams never turns out well. Back in the 1980s, when the White Sox were
threatening to move to Florida, I helped author a plan that called for turning
Comiskey Park into a working national monument.
Technically, the federal government would have picked up the tab of
renovation—with the emphasis on historic, not Jumbo Tron/luxury-suite new—so
maybe I’m talking out of both ends of my mouth here. But I know this. What we proposed was rooted in history, not
Hollywood fantasy.
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