re: #52 FFL (GOP Delenda Est)

Stadium deals in Pittsburgh have always had some shenanigans associated with them. One 3-county bond issue that included a sales tax increase to generate stadium money faced a referendum in 1997 and went down in flames. The ballot counting wasn’t even done when a “Plan B” appeared from nowhere and got steamrollered through so that the citizenry ate a big chunk of the costs.*

The area got two decent stadiums out of it (PNC Park and Heinz Field) plus further development as the Convention Center got some renovations and the University of Pittsburgh then tore down their stadium built in the 1930s and developed the prime piece of Pittsburgh real estate it had previously occupied.

I personally think that if it had been necessary the Rooney family would have worked out a financing deal for a stadium, but were also business savvy enough to take public money if it was offered to them. The ownership of the Pirates pretty much had to be bailed out in this regard.

One of my favorite things about California when it comes to sports is we have, for most of the last 30 years told professional sports teams to go fuck themselves when they ask for public money for non-public stadiums. Hell, we even require the teams that manage publicly owned stadiums to foot the bill for upkeep/updates.