Legislation to have the state subsidize a new Minnesota Twins stadium made some progress at the Legislature, despite lawmakers' misgivings. MPR's Martin Kaste reports that the fate of the Twins Stadium bill had fallen into the hands of the members of the Senate Local and Metropolitan Government Committee…and they were none too happy about it.
The committee's surly mood stemmed from the fact that a deadline was forcing them to pass the stadium bill or let it die of sheer inertia. Committee members say they don't want the state to have to raise hundreds of millions of dollars from a 5-cent cigarette tax and a variety of other user fees and sports merchandise taxes, but also expressed frustration with their own lack of ideas for better ways to finance it.
Transcripts
text | pdf |
MARTIN KASTE: The fate of the Twins stadium bill had fallen into the hands of the Senate local and Metropolitan government committee, and the committee members were none too happy about it. The members' surly mood stemmed from the fact that a Wednesday deadline was forcing them to pass the stadium bill or let it die of inertia.
Committee members said they didn't want the state to have to raise hundreds of millions of dollars from a $0.05 cigarette tax and a variety of other fees and taxes to pay for the stadium. But they also expressed frustration with their own lack of ideas for better ways to finance it. Republican committee member Dick Day, who had been trying to get the committee to hear his idea to fund the stadium with slot machine proceeds, lost his patience with committee chairman, Jim Vickerman.
DICK DAY: The frustration comes is that you don't run the committee, Senator Mo runs the committee, and that's sad for the state of Minnesota. That's sad for the state of Minnesota that the Majority Leader runs this committee. And I can't get my bill heard, and I got the same amount of--
MARTIN KASTE: Day wants to let the Canterbury Park racetrack put in slot machines and then redirect some of the profits to the stadium. The idea is running into resistance from DFL leadership, but Twins president Jerry Bell says he thinks the slot machine revenue might be acceptable.
On another front, stadium supporters are trying to get Minneapolis to get into the action and sweeten the pot with its own subsidy offers. The Twins are putting pressure on Minneapolis officials by injecting competition, or at least the appearance of competition, into the process. Bob Pohlad, son of Twins owner Carl Pohlad, says the Twins aren't dead set on staying in Minneapolis.
BOB POHLAD: To us, it does not make any difference where the site is as long as it keeps infrastructure costs to a minimum and benefits existing businesses as much as it can.
MARTIN KASTE: The local and metropolitan government committee passed the bill, but it also left it in complete disarray. The committee stripped almost all the public financing out of the bill and then handed it off to the taxes committee to let it try to rebuild it. And the chairman of taxes, Cook DFLer Doug Johnson, is openly hostile to a state subsidized stadium. Still, the bill seems to be a survivor. John Commerce, organizer of the anti-stadium lobbying group Fans Advocating Intelligent Spending, says any other bill would have been dead by now.
JOHN COMMERCE: I think the pressures are fairly extreme, and I think Senator Day's sort of outburst in the middle of the committee, talking about how Senator Mo is really behind this committee, whether or not that's true, I think that expresses a common sentiment among the legislators on this committee, which is that there's a great deal of pressure to move it along with or without recommendation.
MARTIN KASTE: Meanwhile, in the House, the stadium bill seems to have stalled. Both its critics and its supporters say they expect the Senate, which doesn't face re-election until the year 2000, to take the lead on the sensitive issue of public financing. From Minnesota Public Radio, I'm Martin Kaste at the Capitol.