Quote:
Originally Posted by SeattleUte
What's more critical to our civic culture, great public schools or an NBA franchse? Seattle schools are not exemplary. How about we improve our schools before we start writing seven figure checks to the likes of Howard Schultz.
Did you know evey time there's a big rain storm raw sewage overflows into Puget Sound? How about we fix that first?
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I threw in Benaroya just as a jab to elicit a response.
I've work with SPS as a client for several years, so I've seen what budget shortfalls have done to their staff. You'll get no argument from me on schools vs. teams. But hear me out on this...
Sports teams are a regional asset not just the cities’. People travel from Vancouver, BC, Spokane, and Portland to see games in Seattle (NFL, NBA, MLB). 2.6M people went to games last year at Safeco - and that was for a crappy team.
Seattle is the center of the NW. The center of Seattle is the Seattle Center. The central tenet of the Seattle Center was the Sonics. Now they're gone.
Because teams are a regional resource, the city itself shouldn't support the burden of public funding (which other cities and owners have shown isn't always needed). Safeco and Quest are subsidized by a hotel and car rental tax – which is mostly paid by tourists and business travelers. If the state extended this tax for several more years, it could have paid for part of a new arena or a renovated Key (with private funds making up the other half).
What pissed me off at that a-hole from OK is he wouldn't even consider a renovated Key as an option. The state wouldn't vote on the tax extension and mayor didn't try to broker the sale from Howard to local ownership two years ago. They all suck.
And I do think it's a loss to the city and region. Maybe not to the symphony crowd, but other parts of town, i.e. Rainer Valley knew and paid attention to the starting five at the Key.