The Chronicle's cheerleading for a soccer stadium
Last week Tom Kirkendall took the Chronicle to task for its sports writers' seemingly pie-in-the-sky hope that TSU will partner with the Dynamo to fund a downtown soccer stadium:
Of course, the article is utterly devoid of details, such as how TSU is going to find any money to throw at this deal, much less make a multi-million dollar investment in it. Heck, the TSU athletic director and the Dynamo's president haven't even met yet, so it doesn't even appear that Dynamo management takes TSU's involvement seriously. Why don't the Chronicle editors just come out and say that they really want the city to finance the downtown soccer stadium and spare us such vapid articles as this one?
Tom also points to a post by Jon Taylor, now blogging at PoliSci@UST, that addresses the economic realities of pro sport franchises and the venues taxpayers buy them. Short point: The benefits generally are slim to none for taxpayers who foot the bill, but quite high for the franchise owner. What a surprise! Five billion dollars of investment downtown, but it's still missing something!
The only thing I would add is that, for all we know, the Chronicle's editorial board could have made a decision to push for a soccer stadium. A couple of years ago, Chron Editor Emeritus Jack Loftis admitted that's what the editorial leadership of the paper decided to do when the city was debating a baseball stadium. And don't forget the Chron's push for light rail. The Chron's editor Jeff Cohen thinks it's the editorial board's business to, "offer guidance about what is good for the people of Houston."
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 05/12/08 05:13 AM | Houston Chronicle | Print | Comments (3)
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