Debate on stadium plan going deep

"Features"

04/27/2005

Mike Kaszuba, Star Tribune
April 27, 2005

One day after being formally unveiled, the newest proposal for a stadium for the Minnesota Twins had a turbulent hearing Tuesday in Hennepin County as opponents argued that the $478 million project was being rushed toward approval without public input.

Though a slim majority of the County Board is believed to support the project, the seven commissioners postponed an initial vote on the 42,000-seat stadium for at least one week. The delay followed a two-hour session in which a familiar throng of supporters and opponents—many of whom have long debated the merits of a new baseball stadium—alternately praised and criticized the plan.

“I’m not surprised by it,” Commissioner Mike Opat, a lead negotiator on the project, said afterward. “It’s a big step.” Opat said stadium supporters would have to wait to see whether a majority of the commissioners would vote for the project.

Gerald Savage: No sales tax hike.Bruce BispingStar TribuneBut Commissioner Linda Koblick, who objected to the attempts to give the plan a quick approval, said after the meeting it probably had enough votes to move forward.

“When does the public get to weigh in on this?” Koblick asked.

Tuesday’s meeting came just two days after an agreement between the Twins and the county was announced to move the team from the 23-year-old Metrodome to an open-air stadium in the Warehouse District of downtown Minneapolis.

The project would include $125 million from the Twins and $235 million from the county to build the stadium. The county’s share would be raised through a countywide 0.15 percent sales tax that would add 3 cents to every $20 purchase.

Penny Steele, Linda KoblickBruce BispingStar TribuneThe project’s total cost, including bonding costs and site preparation, would be $478 million, and the agreement stipulates that the proposal would not be subject to a voter’s referendum.

But it was those types of details Tuesday that quickly led to friction.

“You’re getting taken, guys,” said Dann Dobson, a real estate management official who testified against the stadium.

Dobson and others objected to a provision that would pay up to 18 percent of the gross sales price to a newly created stadium commission should Twins owner Carl Pohlad sell the team before 2016.

While Dobson argued that Pohlad would profit many times over what the county would receive from any sale, county officials stressed that the agreement obligated the Twins to a “no-escape, 30-year lease.” The Twins also would agree not to relocate the team and would oppose any move by Major League Baseball to eliminate the team.

At various points, the meeting featured several onlookers holding homemade signs—one asked the county to “Finish the Cedar Lake Bike Trail”—and a man who rolled an infant in a stroller up to the podium as he testified. William Oosterman of Minneapolis told the commissioners the proposal was “blatant corporate welfare” and a “boondoggle.”

Stadium supporters were equally passionate. Sam Grabarski, executive director of the Downtown Council, said the stadium and the anticipated development surrounding it would be “one of the great epic public works” in Hennepin County history. “I think that three cents on a $20 purchase is not that an outrageous thing,” he said.

Outside the meeting room, Jerry Bell, the president of the Twins’ parent company, watched calmly. “I’m getting used to it,” Bell said. He said that Opat, during negotiations with the team, had told him that while he could not promise the proposal would be approved by the county, Opat “was comfortable [and] felt good” that it would pass.

County officials had attempted Tuesday to take an initial step toward formally asking the Legislature for the authority to increase the local sales tax, an amount that would annually bring in $28 million. But Commissioner Penny Steele said that she had little time to study either the agreement or a series of relatively minor amendments that were offered to it on Tuesday. “This is the first time I have looked at this,” Steele, who is expected to vote against the plan, said of the amendments.

In a break with policy, the board agreed to allow continued public testimony on the stadium at its meeting next Tuesday.

Said Commissioner Mark Stenglein: “There’ll be plenty of time for the public’s input.”