Now that the NBA lockout has been shelved, it’s easier to measure the damage inflicted upon those who aren’t already rich enough to care less. Downtown bars and restaurants that rely on basketball traffic are among the casualties, but Cuyahoga County is sharing in the pain.
As part of the original arrangement to build Quicken Loans Arena, the county is saddled with paying off the debt. According to the tiny print, the county gets 5/8ths of the admission tax on sporting events — revenue that gets funneled back into paying off the loan.
But the NBA lockout cut that money off for nearly two months, and the lost dough amounts to upwards of $800,000 for the season, according to county fiscal officer Wade Steen. That means they’ll have to dip into the general fund to make good on the January mortgage check — about $500,000. “Every revenue source matters in tough economic times, so the fact that the games weren’t played and we have to subsidize a half-million dollars — that could have been utilized in some other way,” Steen says.
And here’s where you come in: Show up by the busload to cheer on the Cavs this season, and the bean counters will sigh with relief. But if Q crowds go the way of Browns fans in December, the county will be on the hook to subsidize the debt again next year.
This article appears in Nov 30 – Dec 6, 2011.
Good article, Kyle. This is another example of the tremendous absorbtion burden placed on the little guy in all forms. Large corporations make smaller ones absorb their mistakes and fighting and contract disputes every day. Big guys think they have no responsibility to the localities in which they profit. American Greetings and other large corps just use the lever of money to be shielded from their obligations to absorb those things which they (often) create. OWS is exposing this reality and media needs to expose this insane reality as much as possible. Nice job, dude.
I am sad because of the big retailers who have told the Salvation Army they are not welcome outside of their malls and department stores. The Salvation Army belongs with Christmas and shopping. I was at Target looking for them last year and the Target folks said they do their own charity work..As though the one month of holiday shopping would be negatively effected by the small alms we give to the Salvation Army. Giant Eagle has them and I love that they do. I will buy nothing from Target until they allow the Salvation Army to stand outside of their empires and ring their bells by the Red Kettles which have been part of Christmas for a hundred years. Big retail are control-freaked out organizations which ruined our small businesses and our towns and cities…and now the bastards want to take away the only good things about Christmas now days.
Target stopped allowing the Red Kettles near their stores in 2004. They have given to The Salvation Army in other way, yet it still leaves them sterile and Scroogish to not have the bells and the people ringing them. This is how retail giants count beans and are run by lawyers and bean-counters. They said that the risk of being boycotted was not going to off-sett the goals of the money saved and controlled as a result of banning the Red Kettles. As giant corporations are always thinking their decisions are correct, Target has not reconsidered the Custer decision made back in 2004. What if they would have started a trend and none of the chains would support the Salvation Army at all? These CEO’s and control-freaks in giant corporations with their lawyers and bean-counters and MBA’s focused on profit and profit only are screwing things up bad. They give only as is required for image sake and it becomes just another aspect of the business..a write off when needed or PR when needed. These guys have control-freaked us long enough..Let’s go back to before lawyers, MBA’s and their shallow bean-counters ruled the world..or the corporate world…or the business world..The old worl of hand-shakes and deals without blood signatatures and absolute turning over of rights to a money guy and his empire of control-freaks.
We were not like this thirty years ago. There were many small and medium sized businesses which were happy being a part of a community and helping people with jobs and good will. The giants started buying up every medium sized business which turned a profit, and then went for the small businesses which could be taken easily and brought into their giant group of control-freaks and greedy men with one focus–money/power.
The days of working for a small company became almost impossible because what businesses the giants did not buy, they took over in other ways. In my business text which I have been working on for five years, I explain how this take-over happened…even as guys like me sold for them and made them hate us for making any commission at all. They wanted to replace salesmen and every human job with computers and robots and be done with the sickness and people problems which go along with the idea of being human. We let them and they took everything and gave little or nothing back but resentment as they would give you a commission check.