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Save millions: Trade the Saints to Minneapolis for the Timberwolves

By John Spry

St. Paul Pioneer Press (MN) – Wednesday, August 29

Minnesota has some of the very best sports facilities in the nation in Target Field and the Xcel Energy Center. So why are we planning to spend more than $200 million to build a second professional baseball stadium and remodel Target Center?

Gov. Dayton wants to spend $150 million to update Target Center for the Timberwolves, $54 million to build a new ballpark for the St. Paul Saints in Lowertown and $54 million to support other sports facilities in St. Paul, such as Xcel Energy Center.

Apparently, the idea is to have both new ballparks and state-of-the-art indoor sports arenas at each end of the new Central Corridor light-rail line. This wasteful duplication shows a lack of respect for taxpayers’ dollars.

A better idea would be to trade the St. Paul Saints to Minneapolis in exchange for the eventual move of the NBA’s Timberwolves to the beautiful Xcel Energy Center. The Saints’ baseball team could play in Target Field when the Twins are on road trips, and the Wild and Wolves could share the Xcel Energy Center.

ESPN the Magazine rated Target Field as the best fan experience in the nation, while Xcel Energy Center won honors as the third-best sports facility nationally. Target Field is a better ballpark than the proposed Lowertown Saints’ stadium. Even a remodeled Target Center still will not be as nice as Xcel.

The Staples Center in Los Angeles provides an example of how multiple teams can share a facility. The LA Lakers, Clippers and Stanley Cup-champion Kings all play at the Staples Center. Sharing sports facilities increases revenue for the existing facilities and avoids squandering valuable public dollars on unnecessary construction.

Greater revenue and avoiding needless building costs for duplicative sports facilities creates a larger economic pie that can be divided among the public sport facility authorities and the teams through future negotiations.

For example, the Twins could benefit from their suites’ increased value because of the opportunity to use the suites on more days. Additional baseball revenue for the public Minnesota Ballpark Authority operating Target Field could sunset the 0.15 percent Hennepin County sales tax sooner.

A bipartisan legislative coalition and Gov. Dayton have already approved diverting Minneapolis tax revenue to remodel Target Center and $47.5 million in economic development bonding authority. From that, St. Paul is asking for $27 million for the Lowertown Saints’ ballpark. In a classic example of pork barrel politics, they also approved $2.7 million per year for 20 years for St. Paul, which could be used for the Xcel Center.

Fortunately, it is not too late to protect taxpayers’ dollars by repealing this imprudent spending.

There are three likely objections to this cost-saving proposal.

First, parochial interests may object to cooperation between Minneapolis and St. Paul. Each city’s political establishment tends to fight for its own narrow interests instead of the more general interest of Minnesota citizens. Respect for Minnesotans’ tax dollars should trump parochial special interests.

Secondly, Target Field has more seats than the minor-league Saints could expect to sell. The Saints could use only the approximately 12,000 lower-level seats between first base and third base that offer the best views.

Finally, politicians erroneously claim that construction spending for these sports facilities will create jobs for Minnesotans. These claims ignore the basic economic concept of opportunity cost. Instead of building duplicative facilities, we could have either more productive public spending, such as improved courts or roads, or reduced taxes on private-sector investments.

The argument against constructing these new sports facilities is deeper than the dollars-and-cents logic of reducing wasteful spending. Subsidies for sports stadiums are an egregious example of crony capitalism.

The St. Paul Saints propose contributing only $10 million dollars toward the construction of their $54 million stadium. St. Paul taxpayers would pay $17 million and Minnesota taxpayers would pay $27 million. Similarly, the Timberwolves would not pay the full cost of renovating Target Center.

When we subsidize the owners of these professional sports teams, we redistribute income from everyone to a handful of wealthy individuals. This redistribution to the rich should trouble both principled liberals and conservatives.

John Spry is an associate professor in the department of finance at the University of St. Thomas.