This is why cities should not build facilities for pro sports teams

I guess the good news in all of this is that hockey fans in Phoenix, Arizona will get to keep the Coyotes in Glendale, Arizona. The bad news is it is going to cost the residents of the city a heck of a lot of money. It looks like the latest deal is to give potential buyer Matt Hulsizer 100 million dollars next week when he completes the purchase of the team from the NHL. Then the city may give him up to 97 million dollars over the next five years for his organization to stage non hockey events at the stadium. The city plans to make the money back by charging for parking and selling off naming rights for each of the parking lots around jobbing.com arena.

For that price the City of Glendale could have bought the team from the NHL directly. In the sports world it is not unheard of for a municipality to own a sports teams as Lucas County in Ohio owns a minor league baseball and hockey team. However the plan seems to be shell out more money to keep the Coyotes in town, after building Jobbing.com arena for a price tag of 225 million dollars.

Instead of getting a tenant who would ya know pay rent and give the city some return on its investment, the city of Glendale is now doing whatever it can to keep the Coyotes in town and give their investment in the arena a chance. To be fair Hulsizer seems committed to building a winner, and has kicked in 25 million of his own money to help get a deal done.

With that being said, if the Coyotes cannot operate in Arizona without this kind of government subsidization they should not stay in Arizona. In is really that simple. The citizens should not have to keep handing out corporate welfare for a team that doesn’t seem to be able to make any profit.