The Billionaire Sports Team Owners Taking Their Ball and Going Elsewhere

People are fighting their scare tactics in favor of a better use of public money — and winning.

by Sebastian Ward, More Perfect Union

Billion-dollar professional sports teams across the country are teaming up with legislators to coax their local communities into giving them more money for new stadiums.

Their tactic is simple: they demand funding for their private endeavors, and if the public doesn’t comply, they move to another city desperate for a team and willing to outbid their current home. Last year for example, the leadership of Major League Baseball’s Athletics announced their intention to move to Las Vegas from Oakland, where the team has been based since 1968 and home to four World Series titles. 

As a result, one community loses an iconic institution that has stood for generations, while another sees millions in public funds diverted from essential services such as schools, housing, and transportation to subsidize the unproductive ventures of billionaires. 

But after decades of wealthy team owners getting their way, people across the country are starting to fight back against these exploitative practices.

“Professional sports in North America are almost the definition of a cartel, right?” Neil DeMause, who co-authored a book about sports stadium controversies, told More Perfect Union. “You've got a very limited group of very rich people who have an asset that they're not going to let anybody else get, and they use that for leverage at every opportunity.”

The A’s situation that’s underway right now is one of the most egregious examples of siphoning public funds away to expensive projects. John Fisher, the billionaire heir to The Gap fortune and the owner of the Oakland A’s, plans to move his team to Las Vegas, armed with nearly $400 million from taxpayers.

The funding package to build the stadium was approved by the Nevada legislature last summer, despite a vigorous campaign led by Nevada teachers advocating for the funds to be instead invested in public education. Schools over Stadiums, an initiative from the state teachers’ union pushing to fund the public school system instead of building a billionaire-owned stadium, sued the Nevada Legislature. They wanted to put stadium funding on the ballot and let voters have a say.

Not only is the livable wage in Nevada twice the state's minimum wage, but the state's public schools also rank 47th in the nation for per-pupil funding. Virginia, by comparison, has a similar minimum wage to cost-of-living ratio, yet invests $4,000 more per pupil in K-12 education.

But despite a push from educators for more funding to reduce class sizes and increase salaries, not to mention the fact that fewer than half of third graders are proficient in reading, the legislative session ended with only an extra $2 billion for education. Chris Daly, the Nevada State Education Association’s political director, praised the new funding but noted it doesn't offset rising operational costs. “Even with that $2 billion, we didn't really catch up much,” he told More Perfect Union.

Investing in a failing education system would undoubtedly be beneficial to the citizens in Nevada, but what about a sports stadium? The resounding answer is no. When asked if subsidies for building stadiums will cost taxpayers more than the economic benefits gained, a study conducted by the University of Chicago found that 42 out of 43 economists surveyed fully agreed. “The worst possible thing to spend public money on is a sports stadium,” deMause says. 

But even as public skepticism of taxpayer financing has grown, billionaire owners have continued to pressure local governments to keep the money flowing. Kansas City, Missouri residents saw through the lip service of the MLB’s Royals' owners and lobbyists and voted to reject a sales tax bill to fund stadium projects; as a result, the franchise threatened to relocate across state lines into Kansas. 

After a major lobbying campaign, which included inviting Kansas legislators to a steakhouse dinner to get the pitch from lobbyists, a Royals executive, and labor union representatives, state lawmakers offered legislation that would issue bonds to cover 75 percent of stadium projects for either the Royals or Chiefs. The bonds, requiring an investment of at least $1 billion, would not need to be repaid in full until 30 years from now. Now, Missouri is planning to make a competitive offer to both teams.

This is commonplace: when the teams don’t get their way, they often start a bidding war. 

In Charlotte, North Carolina, there are ongoing debates over a city plan to allocate $1.3 billion dollars to upgrading Bank of America Stadium, where the Carolina Panthers play. Recent polls show that 60 percent of Charlotteans oppose the proposal; now, Tepper is threatening to relocate the Panthers if negotiations continue to persist slowly. (Charlotte city officials have notably downplayed public opposition to the plan, according to WFAE.) 

In Chicago, the Bears are requesting for $2.4 billion in public funds to build a new domed stadium on the lakefront. The proposal has already been met with opposition from the environmental advocacy group Friends of the Parks, who previously sued to block the construction of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art owing to a city ordinance that prohibits “further private development be permitted east of Lake Shore Drive.” The new stadium would be built on that same site. (The Lucas Museum was eventually established in Los Angeles.) Chicagoans have also expressed concern about funding such a project while many sections of the city remained impoverished and neglected.

Although Bears team president Kevin Warren has flirted with offers from mayors in other cities, he has remained resolute on building the dome on the Chicago lakefront. Warren was the Bears' top CEO candidate due to his successful role in constructing the U.S. Bank Stadium for the Vikings in 2016, who are hoping he can replicate that success. 

Perhaps as a reminder of just how far public opinion has shifted on these giveaways, however, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker has dismissed the Bears’ plan for public financing as a “non-starter.” 

The “take my ball and go home” tactic of companies worth billions of dollars pressuring communities to offer up funding that can go to public service is a gross example of corporate exploitation. As for the Oakland A’s, their owner’s fumble has resulted in a situation where the team — currently playing out its pitiful final season in Oakland — is expected to spend the next three seasons playing in a minor league baseball stadium in Sacramento until the Vegas stadium is ready.  

“All they're doing is exploiting the public and trying to put lipstick on a pig by saying they're gonna do all this stuff for the community,” Last Dive Bar co-founder Bryan Johansson, whose group supports the Athletics and sells t-shirts for charity, told More Perfect Union. “And many, many studies have shown that that's just not the case. These big stadium things don't give back what is put in from the community and the public.”

Many Nevadans appear to share that sentiment. 

“There's a question of misplaced priorities,” Daly told More Perfect Union. “Do we want public funds to subsidize an out-of-state billionaire to build a new stadium? Or do we want to invest in Nevada kids, families, and educators, and in Nevada?”

“I think what we're seeing,” he added, “is that every day Nevadans agree that Nevada should prioritize our schools, our kids, our future, and not some gleaming project that really only makes the rich get richer.”