Cavs Waive Rookie Mychel Thompson
February 6, 2012
While We’re Waiting… Cord Phelps’ time, Loving some Kyrie and the Tribe’s window to win
February 7, 2012The Cleveland Browns have reportedly received word that the city of Cleveland will forward the team $5.8 million for requested stadium renovations. Thomas Ott of The Plain Dealer reports that Cleveland’s city council has approved a plan that will help provide an advance to be used to fix specific areas of the 12-year-old open air venue.
In a hearing, the Browns reportedly came armed with a detailed breakdown of money that has been spent on similar endeavors since the stadium’s erection back in 1999: $74 million contributed to the construction; $50 million paid for items such as escalators, a restaurant and team shop; $30 million spent on cleaning and other everyday maintenance; $2.9 million donated to community programs and sports facilities.
The city of Cleveland confirmed the need for renovations, but in their agreement of providing the advance, will rid the city of such obligations for the next seven years. At this point, the city would have to dip into sin tax funding (alcohol and tobacco) for an immediate needs.
The team’s initial request was met with plenty of disdain as the Cleveland Browns had just finished a 4-12 season, their worst since 2008. Following the initial release, it had been made public that the team was not asking for immediate funds as much as letting the city know that such repairs were in fact needed. At the very worst, it was merely another line item on the team’s never-ending list of public relations blunders.
[Related: Fair or Foul? City Of Cleveland Giving $5 Million to Renovate League Park]
15 Comments
What a disgrace to the citizens of Cleveland. With so many areas needing improvement, the city decides to spend millions on renovating a stadium owned by a corporation. Further, the stadium took up valuable multi-use land that could have been used to attract Clevelanders and tourists to invest in the city. Instead, we have a building that is used 8 TIMES A YEAR! This short-sighted thinking by Cleveland city council and its government leaders has fully led to the deterioration of the city over time. Believe me, I’m a Browns fan and have been all my life, but this is just a disgrace to our tax money to invest in something so short-sighted.
they have a contract. when you have a contract you have to fulfill it. no, they did not need to advance the money, but they would have to pay it eventually.
also, why is city council worried about paying the remainder of the obligation? they have collected $13mil/year on something they payout $850K/year. Shouldn’t they have looked forward and realized when it ran out and made sure to save enough to cover it?
[The Browns] “paid for items such as…a restaurant and team shop”
They really listed things that they and they alone profit from? You have got to be kidding me.
IIRC, the city only had to start giving the Browns $850K annually, beginning this year. Which means every year previous to this one they just pocketed that amount…or it went to Dimorra’s wild flings in Vegas.
Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Well, the city does profit from sales tax from both the restaurant and the team shop, remember?
Yeah! Total disgrace! I don’t want a sports team! Go away Browns! I want another park where people can sell drugs!
Yeah, investing money in something that brings in TONS of revenue, especially in a city that has SO MANY OTHER WAYS to generate income seems really asinine huh!? 😉
Just like everything else the new stadium wasn’t handled correctly from the start. A cookie cutter stadium slapped up in a hurry to go along with an organization that was assembled in much the same manner. And you wonder why, 11 years later, this team is the way it is. It’s a shamockery!
For me, this isn’t so much about the $6M as it is re-evaluating a terrible stadium deal ten+ years later. We gave up prime water-front property for a privately owned, architecturally uninspired outdoor football stadium. For that, the region and the taxpayers took on a tremendous financial burden that it’ll be paying on for decades to come. And what did we get in return? Arguably the worst ten+ years of football in the league (the Bills may be worse) from a franchise that inspires less joy than the misery it causes.
A verboten thought: the region would be better off, both fiscally and emotionally, if we never got the Browns back. I smell an “It’s a Wonderful Life” knockoff.
You had me until the part about never getting the Browns back. A football team was needed just perhaps not necessarily not the Cleveland Browns. There was entirely to much emotion over what happened with the move to Baltimore and really it was the NFL and the politicians who took advantage. Who did they take advantage of? Who else, the fans and people of the city of Cleveland.
Cuyahoga County takes 1.25% of the sales tax rate, which gets split up among the cities as I understand it. You can hardly consider that “profit” on the team shop and (beverages in the) restaurant, when it’s a mere pittance compared to what the Browns take home.
The Browns are making a killing on the team shop and restaurant, they should pay to build it.
So if taxpayers build a privately owned corporation a multi-million dollar office here, provide them cash for repairs, give them tax breaks, etc., that corporation can bring in tons of revenue for themselves…. I never would have guessed.
Yeah, I feel the need to estrange even those who might agree with me.
[Probably breaking all sorts of taboos with such a long response, so I apologize — but it was fun to write, and you don’t have to read it if you don’t want to. Just note: I AM glad we got the franchise back and DON’T want to see them go. I just wanted to put this in a different light.]
I remember this one time my best friend’s dad decided to
move their family to a different city. I was REALLY bummed, and wanted my best
friend back, and thought the entire thing was unfair. So I decided I was going
to try to lure my best friend back by building him a new house. I borrowed $300
from the bank to do it, and even offered to pay for any electrical or
structural repairs – you know, the expensive part of upkeep. My friend agreed
he’d pay to wash the dishes and vacuum the carpet, and then, because I wanted
to make at least a little money back, I charge him 25 cents per year to rent it
from me. He only uses the house 8 times per year, and he hosts parties there
where he charges admission to all our friends (including me) and makes tons of
money for himself, but you know, he throws me a little change off each person
who comes in, so that’s nice. I thought about charging his guests for parking
or sharing his other revenue on account of it being my house, but in the end we
decided it’d probably be best if he just got to control of all that money. I
was just glad to have my friend back! I wasn’t even all that upset when my
great lawyer who brokered that deal decided to go work for my friend instead –
he makes a lot more money there, so that’s understandable.
And besides, it’s not like the house sits empty for the
other 357 days of the year, because I get to use it 8 times, too! So that’s
only 349 empty days. Which seems sort of sad, because it’s right on the lake, and if I
built a sweet mixed-use place to have fun in with my other friends who never
left, I’d actually probably make more money off those activities than I do off
my friend and I’d have never had to spend the original $300 plus hundreds more in
repairs…but hey, I got my friend back!
Oh yeah, about that $300 plus hundreds more in repairs.
Well, being older and having my own kids, I started charging them and their
friends a little extra for rides to the theater and such (which seems fair, b/c
sitting and watching movies isn’t super healthy anyway). I raise $13 a year
from the little buggers, which I would LOVE to sock away to pay for those
hundreds in future repairs, except that I owe the bank a ton of interest on
that original $300. So the whole $13/yr went to the interest. Which I’m still paying off, and will be for awhile, and I will need to pay for those repairs, too,
spread out over a bunch of years so it doesn’t hit me too hard. But now my
friend wants $6 of that repair money upfront, which I thought I’d have 7 years to give him. Credit to him, he’s been holding up his end of the bargain, what with the vacuuming and such
(he even gave a poor person 3 cents!), so I think I’m just going to give it to
him now…I mean I’m struggling a bit with the interest and haven’t been able to
save up for the future repairs to my house that he rents for 25 cents/yr, and I also
lost my job recently and have to work two jobs for less pay, so things are
tight and I’m worried. But hey, I have my friend back! And at least he’s making a ton of money
off that house that I built that he uses…good to know someone is. And I really
don’t want to lose him again.
Only, there’s this weird nagging feeling I get. It’s just
that, every time he’s in town and uses my house – he’s not the same friend he
used to be. In fact, he’s not only bad now, he’s been a really bad friend for
the entire decade he’s been back. He charges me admission to get into the house
that I built and own and will mostly pay to maintain (until I have to build him
a new one) that he uses for 25 cents per year, and that might not bother me,
but the more I think about it – every time I visit I leave feeling COMPLETELY miserable. Just doesn’t seem fair. His thrice-paid-for company is the
wuuurst.
I’m kind of not wanting to give him that $6 upfront now…
Can someone help me out here? I don’t understand the animosity. Wasn’t
Model’s reason for taking the Browns to Baltimore money? And wasn’t one of his complaints that he had
to pay for repairs to the stadium out of his own pocket? Do we really want the
city of Cleveland to start being all cheap with Learner, an owner who arguably cares
more about his pro soccer team? I tend
to think there are a lot of cities out there that would gladly pay all stadium repairs
for the chance to have an NFL team. Yes,
I know the Browns are tied to Cleveland for a long time, but do we really want
to start down the road of hard-balling an owner who isn’t interested in selling
the team and whose ties to Cleveland aren’t that strong?
Hey, if Cleveland is the only city out there that is
paying for stadium repairs, then I agree, that is something that can be
renegotiated when the next contract comes up.
After what Model did to this city, I’d think keeping an environment that
is as pro-owner as possible is the best way to make sure history doesn’t repeat
itself.