About yesterday's state "public hearing" on the new ballpark

I caught the important parts of yesterday's State Building Commission public hearing on Mayor Karl Dean's ballpark proposal even though I did not get there when the meeting started. I was late for several valid reasons. First, of all I do not get paid for lobbying for a new minor league ballpark or for rezoning to develop multi-use dwellings or for accruing campaign finance bling from influential sources or for reporting those who do. So, unlike most of the people in the committee room yesterday, I had to take time off my job to drive downtown, find a parking space, hike several blocks to Legislative Plaza and wander from place-to-place with a couple other average Joes looking for an outside entrance to where Tennessee keeps its committee rooms (found them in a bunker under the Plaza) before I finally settled into my standing-room-only spot at the back of the room next to bureaucrats and professional politicos about 20 minutes into the meeting.

The crowd was not standing-room-only because a flood of community-based types showed up for the hearing. Not hardly. It was standing-room-only because there were only about 50 chairs in the gallery and most of those were taken up by government and business-interest suits or journalists or lobbyists. I did not see any of the neighbors I saw at the Mayor's launch party at the Farmers Market. And, strangely, I did not see any of the red-shirted glee club of supporters of a new Sulphur Dell. That is strange to me because CM Jerry Maynard has pounded the proposition that the ballpark is wildly popular out here in the streets, and he has had the red shirt squad to show for it before. The legs on the initiative may actually have little to do with what those of us outside-looking-in actually opine about a new ballpark anyway.

But even if ordinary citizens were available to attend a meeting in the middle of a workday morning, there was no room for them either in space or agenda. The hearing ran like clockwork with representatives of business special interests (Jefferson Street United Merchants Partnership, Nashville Convention & Visitors Bureau) and government officials (CM Maynard, State Senator Thelma Harper and someone from the Sports Authority) all expressing predictable support for the ballpark. I asked one journalist if anyone actually representing a neighborhood spoke before JUMP did (which was when I arrived), and he said no. So, no one but those with a vested financial interest having little to do with quality of life spoke on the ballpark question.

There was no discernible direction from the chair for opponents to speak. One big shot after the other approached the podium and was recognized by the chair before he said, "Anyone else want to speak?" I was not sure whether his offer was to any of the other nabobs or it was a stooped invitation to the few plebs present, so I did not break for the microphone myself. Very quickly the chair asked for a vote, got a unanimous one and the ballpark deal was gavelled "approved". It all seemed scripted, especially to a guy like me who is more used to the rancor and pitchforks on unsettled development questions that we tend to see in Metro Council chambers. In the end it probably did not matter that I missed a chance to speak. I'm sure I would have gotten a "who-the-hell-are-you?" look from the commissioners coming on the heels of speakers in slick suits and royal ascot hats.

In the end, I'm sure it was not unintentional to actually make the public feel out-of-place at a state public hearing. Barring some sort of groundswell of resistance to the Mayor's plan, it is fast tracked to win like a well-sired 3-year-old flanked by experienced stable hands. Any concerned community critics who are not organized are going to get trampled underfoot now that bill sponsors can claim red-state support.

A few thoughts on Sulphur Dell since the Mayor's financing plan is introduced

You cannot look to ballpark supporters for sober cost-benefit analysis on the question of financing a new Sulphur Dell and subsidizing the Nashville Sounds in the process. I have a few observations about the events of the past few days in the spirit of being more rational about that process:

• The Friday late afternoon news dump of this story last week was curious. A couple of hours before today's ballpark meeting was announced GOP State House Speaker Beth Harwell announced to the news media that she would not support dedicating $35 million in state funding for Karl Dean's new bus rapid transit east-west Nashville connector, "The Amp". That can always change, but for the time being it is a blow to the Dean infrastructure priority list. It is a blow to his brick-and-mortarmentum. The Sulphur Dell announcement could have been planned all along or it could have been announced to soften the PR blow on and divert news media attention from a limping Amp plan.
• It is obvious that Karl Dean's modus operandi is to move ahead with these voluptuous capital budget plans with minimal popular input. He pursued the new convention center even though local opinion polls indicated that Nashvillians did not support it. He threatened to demolish a popular working-class entertainment venue, the State Fairgrounds, and sell off most of the land to private developers until there was impressive public backlash threatening to rip Metro Council limb-from-limb. Hizzoner could have eliminated most of the strong, organized popular opposition to the AMP by moving bus rapid transit north to Charlotte, but he dug in his heels and all but dared state Republicans to kill funding. They are able to embrace popular opposition, and the Amp is on the verge of unraveling. Likewise, he is ramming the ballpark plan through the Sports Authority and Metro Council with no regard to public questions or feedback. We will see if he can push this before any organized opposition gains the footing necessary to slow or stop the ballpark.
• In the context of today's meeting announcing the financing plan, the October 24 "community meeting" continues to appear to have nothing to do with the community. None of the questions asked by the community are being considered. Everything is running to script and any of the concerns that many of us have about traffic, parking, flooding, fireworks, etc. are generally being ignored, even by the Mayor's Office of Neighborhoods. Buoyed by Metro's offer to build them a garage, the state is fully on board now. If Metro will not listen to community concerns, what chance do we have the state?
• Our council member, Erica Gilmore, is ignoring the questions from the October community meeting. She does not seem to care to represent all of us. During tonight's council proceedings, she was described by one reporter as "celebratory" about the ballpark plan. Not a concern in the world about community impact. She seems to have checked out on some of us.
• Before people start waxing on about how historic and "uniquely Nashville" the Sulphur Dell agreement is, they need to keep this in mind: the Metro Finance Director admits that the plan for Metro subsidizing the Sounds' new digs is based on the practices of other cities. Metro taxpayers are going to cough up $65 million to help pro baseball owners get wealthier because other cities do exactly the same thing. Ironically, being like other cities violates Metro Planning's first guiding principle: Be Nashville.
• Seven years ago I expressed qualified support for the previous administration's plan to increase Metro operating budget spending $250,000 per year in maintenance costs for a new ballpark at the old downtown thermal plant site. It seemed like a fair trade-off, given that Greer Stadium required $5 million to bring it up to ADA compliance (completed in 2009 after the old deal fell through). I was more open previously to tax-increment financing (also a part of Dean's deal). I have had a change of heart about TIF, which I find to be overused and abused by opportunistic politicians nowadays. The Mayor's current proposal to carve out $345,000 from the annual operating budgets may not seem much more than the older plan, but we live in different times: cash flow to Metro services seems more strapped as the years go by. And a ballpark at the thermal site generated fewer questions about the potential negative impact on residential neighborhoods than the Sulphur Dell site does. Any support I express for a new Sulphur Dell has even more qualifications than my previous support.
• The Mayor admits that the Nashville Sounds baseball club will not be contractually obligated to pay the $50 million that he plans on them paying for development. So, why would they need to hire a big-money lobbyist when they are not even required to pay for the development?

After going through the financials, I am still not ready to support a new Sulphur Dell without some assurances that Salemtown's quality of life will be protected. I am also not satisfied with how the concerns of the community, democratically expressed, are being overlooked and ignored by those we elect to represent us.

Inconvenient authority member got the hook

SouthComm a few weeks ago on Sports Authority deliberations about LP Field upgrades:

The renovations — first proposed in October — will be funded through bonds backed by the $2 seat-user fee. The Titans have asked that the Metro Council add another dollar to that charge as well.

"In working diligently … we can get the best deal we can get. We commit to get the best deal for this building we possibly can. We will stay within this budget and get it done. We have always tried to do things … the right way without spending too much money," Titans Vice President Don MacLachlan said.

Nevertheless, authority member Rusty Lawrence pressed MacLachlan on whether the team would come out of pocket to pay for any overruns.

"There won't be a cost overrun. … We'll come underneath. Trust me," MacLachlan said. Later, Titans CFO Jeneen Kaufman said the team would come back to the authority in the event the project is over budget.

SouthComm today on said authority member:

It appears outspoken Nashville Sports Authority member Rusty Lawrence has not been re-appointed to the authority.

UPDATE: SouthComm walks the story back with comment about nebulous mayoral intentions:

Mayor's office doesn't have an announcement on whether Rusty Lawrence will be reappointed to the sports authority. His term ended Dec. 19.

Predatory sports may be cheating Nashville out of money and jobs

NewsChannel5's Phil Williams is the only local journo all over the story on the propriety of Nashville Predators hockey intending to extend their no-bid contract with one NHL insider's concessions company to mid-century. Williams highlights the hockey club's contract with the Courthouse that requires them to hold a "competitive bidding process similar to that being used by the Metropolitan Government" for selecting concessionaires. In the video report Williams catches the Predators' president lying in saying that he checked with other concessions companies before deciding to extend the contract of Delaware North. Like a good reporter should, Williams followed up with other concessionaires who denied that the Predators had called them.

Here's Williams' entire report:

Preds fans: Bail you out once, shame on me. Can't get bailed out again

Either Nashville's hockey fan base has failed us again or Nashville simply lacks the fan base to support an NHL hockey team. Either way, it is fanantical failure.

At mid-point, the Nashville Predators are on track to fail to put the minimum 14,000 fans per match in the seats for the third season running. Meeting that minimum qualifies the team for the NHL's revenue sharing plan:  that's free money spread around to small market teams like Nashville from the big market teams. That windfall is so big that Predators owners tell the Tennessean that they are going to buy thousands of their franchise's own tickets to get themselves up to the 14,000 average.

The Metro Sports Authority and their yell leader, mostly-Bellevue-and-only-sometimes-at-Large council member Charlie Tygard, try to reassure the Tennessean that everything is fine and that this will not cost Nashville any money. But these are the kinds of financial burdens that motivate professional sports teams to renegotiate contracts with cities. It may not cost Nashville anything right now, but this will likely come back to haunt us when the Predators have absorbed enough blows and demand the bargaining table to negotiate away their rising costs, as they did with Karl Dean not too long ago.

The more the Predators buy up their own tickets, the less disposable income they have in the future and chances increase that they will trap us into new leases just as ill-advised as the old ones (any lease that leaves Nashville with the rationale, "What else can we do?" is stupid). And, once again, the blame goes to their fan base for failing to buy the tickets.