As Joe Reedy reported on Monday, Mike Brown used his annual media appearance to make it very clear that the he feels that no longer feels any responsibility for working with the County to re-structure the financial mess the Stadium Fund has created for the County. The Fund, approved by Hamilton County Taxpayers, build Paul Brown Stadium (and GABP) and continues to pay for upkeep and improvements. Because tax receipts have not met their projections, the County is considering many options to cover the gap, from raising taxes to shifting revenue.WDR has covered this issue extensively, and instead of rehashing old arguments, scroll through these past posts.
The quick overview is this:
- Mike Brown and his team of lawyers completely out-lawyered lead Hamilton County Commissioner Bob Bedinghaus.
- The Bengals got one of this most lucrative sweetheart stadium deals ever.
- Mike Brown then hired Bob Bedinghaus, who is still currently employed by the team as a "Director of Business Development."
- As the financial problems mounted, the Bengals did offer to make a $40M concession, though with the caveat that they could get out of the contract in 2017, or 15 years before it is supposed to expire on 2032.
- The Bengals have now pulled this offer after a non-response from Hamilton County, who have set an August 31st deadline to respond.
- If you know Mike Brown personally, he is generally a nice guy.
- In his public life, however, Mike Brown often says things that make him come off as cold, without emotion and generally heartless.
- Mike Brown has surprised many by spending money on free agents this offseason, albeit ones with a history of questionable character decisions.
I'm not sure I can 100% agree with you on this. No company would just renegotiate their lease with a city at a higher cost to the business. Do you think in three years if the Morlein brewey is making money had over fist they'll just decide one day they want to pay a higher lease and make less profits to bail the city out?? I doubt it. The city here is trying to make the Bengals their scapegoat for their own mistakes in negotiating the lease in the first place. Also think about this too, one of the reasons Castilini owns the reds now is because the city decided that they wanted to move the new bengal stadium 1000 feet to the west and paid Castilini a ton of money for his land there. As much of a idiot MB can be he is telling the truth about the wasted 100 million.
I'm sorry but i don't think the Bengals are under any obligation to bail out the county and city when they screwed it up in the first place.
Would anyone on here offer to pay extra taxes to help make up the shortfall, i doubt it.
Posted by: the truth | July 30, 2010 at 09:48 AM
Does anyone get this 'odd' feeling that Mikey Boy was told that he better 'make an effort' or that he would lose control of the Bengals or would be told that his team would be the first US team of the European Football League?
Makes me wonder.
Posted by: wch | July 30, 2010 at 10:13 AM
The politicians will never learn if Mike Brown and people like him call "do over" after the politicians have cut a bad deal. This is actually not Mike Brown's wrong doing or problem. This is a wrong doing of democratically elected city officials. How do you not sensitize your tax receipt projections to severe downside scenarios and then design the tax under the most conservative scenario? How does that happen? That would be a complete and utter failure in any business - one that would result in the responsible employee being fired. And remember, this projection error was not a small miss - it was HUGE. Absolutely gargantuan. But in the world of politics, the blame merely gets shifted around and pushed off. The whole thing makes me sick, especially the fact that politicians are trying to displace the blame onto the Bengals (and Reds).
Posted by: Artrell | July 30, 2010 at 12:03 PM
Since I live in Pennsylvania and therefore am not affected by these politics and shouldn't comment on them, I'll simply state that regardless of who's fault it is that the county is in this predicament, there's certainly an ethical shortfall when the guy who negotiated the deal on the county's side turns around and jumps into the Bengals organization.
With that said, anyone else see one of the Raven's three subpar cornerbacks (Damonique Foxworth) is now out for the season with a knee injury?
Posted by: Wyatt | July 30, 2010 at 01:21 PM
What Wyatt said...
Posted by: BMN | July 30, 2010 at 07:32 PM
Also with Wyatt...
Posted by: comrade guttersnake | August 01, 2010 at 09:36 AM
Mike Brown might be a "nice guy" amongst his friends but really, who cares? He's been a POS to the taxpayers of Hamilton County......way above and beyond than he needs to be. That being said, he's Mikey Boy, we all know him and he will never change so we have to live with this joke. Yeah, we enabled him by allowing that clown Bob Bedinghaus to screw us over but then again, we voted for it so as usual we Cincinnatians will just have to live with our mistakes and accept them. At this point, I would be happy if Mikey just fired Big Bob. Well, I guess he owes him for orhcestrating the hose job aka the lease and we all know how "loyal" Mikey is to his friends(too bad he doesn't consider the fans/taxpayers friends).Also, I heard that nobody puts a shine on Mikey's uh ...........car like Bob does so I guess his job is secure.
Posted by: PAl | August 02, 2010 at 12:37 PM
PAI, I don't commonly offer unsolicited advice, but I would recommend an investment in some sort of an online english class. Don't short-change your future.
Seriously, where do these people come from?
Posted by: Artrell | August 03, 2010 at 01:31 PM
Atrell, thank you so much for your "unsolicited advice". I feel so special since you don't "commonly offer" it.(I'm sure you don't). However, I'm doing quite well so no need to worry about me or my future.
Thanks again for the concern,
One of those people
Seriously Artrell, get over yourself.
Posted by: PAl | August 03, 2010 at 07:44 PM