The Bucks Arena Deal Stinks!!!

Just to put the Buck’s arena deal in perspective, and maybe in a new light for some, check out the article below and all the additional links. It ties up a lot of the loose ends. Appalling and almost surreal, Wisconsin isn’t just open for business, it’s being sold off to business with reckless disregard:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker pushed Bucks arena deal while employing a Bucks owner-David Sirota and Andrew Perez of International Business Times: In the year leading up to the announcement of his presidential campaign, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker championed a high-profile proposal to spend a quarter of a billion dollars of taxpayer money to help finance a new Milwaukee Bucks arena … One of those who stands to benefit from the controversial initiative is a longtime Walker donor and Republican financier who has just been appointed by the governor to head his presidential fundraising operation.

Real estate mogul Jon Hammes, who has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Republican candidates and causes, is a prominent member of the investor group that owns Milwaukee’s NBA team. Last week CNN reported that he also will serve as the Walker campaign’s national finance co-chairman. Days after that appointment, Walker’s Republican allies in the Wisconsin state Senate backed the governor’s proposal to spend public funds on a new arena for the Bucks.

Hammes became one of the part owners of the Bucks in 2014. A little more than three months later, Walker unveiled his proposal to spend a quarter of a billion dollars on a new arena for the team.

Hammes’ financial interest in Walker’s arena subsidy package may not be limited to just his stake in the team. According to local news reports, his real estate firm also also bought parcels of downtown land near the location of the proposed new arena. Hammes’ firm also was contracted by the local chamber of commerce to evaluate new stadium proposals.

As much as I would like the Bucks to stay in Milwaukee, I can't get past the behind the scene schemes hatched to get this done, along with the eventual campaign cash Walker will get from this deal. The fact that this is all a political game for wealth and power has soured me on the whole deal. 

Scott Walker, the Roadkill Candidate, may add Bucks to list.

Remember this amazing Scott Walker budget item?

The Governor's proposed budget eliminates$700,000 a year for the DNR to remove the carcasses statewide.

Thankfully, maybe even oddly, Republicans thought to cut that idea out of the budget.

But the Milwaukee Buck's arena might just be as dead as those bloating carcasses on the roadside, and good riddance. Journal Sentinel:

It's unclear if Republicans could get the needed votes from Democrats in the Senate.

Here's what every Democrats should be saying, even if it means saying sayonara to the Bucks, who's owner by the way has already threatened to move. Sen. Bob Wirch got it exactly right, changing my own position on this:

Asked if he could support the Bucks plan, Sen. Bob Wirch (D-Kenosha) said, "Hell, no."

He said the notion is unpopular in his district because Walker rejected a Hard Rock casino proposed by the Menominee tribe in Kenosha. The Menominee had offered to bankroll building the Bucks arena in one of its proposals.

The proposed casino was fiercely fought by the Potawatomi, whose Milwaukee casino is the most lucrative in the state.

"Tell the Potawatomi to pay for (the arena) — they killed the (casino) deal," Wirch said.

Billionaire Bucks Arena gets funding from Debt Collections and Penalty Fees from the Poor.

Corporate welfare has now completely displaced public funding for the common good. Like our public colleges. Although not a direct exchange of money, it's awful close, and highlights what really matters now in our Republican hellhole of a state.

Now word is getting out that the poor and fiscally strapped Wisconsinites will be the ones paying for the Buck's arena. As WPR's Shawn Johnson explains, the idea is ruthless:



This is outrageous beyond words, so I'm glad Think Progress saved me from having to write about this:

Wisconsinites Blast Scott Walker’s Stadium Deal As ‘Outrageous’: Building a new, publicly financed basketball stadium for the Milwaukee Bucks is either a horrendous example of corporate welfare and official corruption, or a chance to reinvigorate an economically depressed city. Several local officials are also speaking out against the county’s promise to collect $4 million per year in unpaid debts from residents, plus a penalty fee of 15 percent, to contribute to the stadium. For example, a woman who owed $1,000 for an old traffic ticket would be charged $1,150.

Milwaukee County Supervisor John Weishan, Jr. called the proposal to go after unpaid ambulance rides, delinquent property taxes and court fees “crony capitalism.”

“This plan shifts the cost of the new arena from the state and the Milwaukee Bucks’ new wealthy owners to the poorest in our community. I will not foreclose on someone’s home or shake down a senior for unpaid medical bills in order to build an arena for millionaires and billionaires.”

Whether or not it’s morally right to collect these debts to pay for the stadium, some county officials say it may not be possible, because most of the residents that owe that money are indigent.

Really Bad for other Local businesses: Redistributes wealth upward:

Economics professor Michael Rosen at Milwaukee Area Technical College said, “People have a fixed entertainment budget. So if they go see the Bucks and spend $60 or $80 on a ticket, that’s money they’re not using to go to the theater or movies or out to eat. It’s not new money, it’s just redistributed. That’s why stadiums have no positive impact on economic growth.” He also noted that most Bucks player don’t live year-round in Milwaukee, so “millions of dollars in their salaries will leak out of the community.”

Walker's corporate Socialism; otherwise known as neo-fascism: The major media is now sounding the alarm as well:

Scott Walker, Our First Socialist President: First, the Communists: Socialism is "a way of organizing a society in which major industries are owned and controlled by the government." It's the state of Wisconsin using tax dollars to build a sports arena for the billionaire owners of the Milwaukee Bucks, and its main proponent is Governor Scott Walker.

If Gov. Walker is to be the candidate of the true believers, the free market, Ayn Rand, and austerity bugs, he's got some explaining to do. What's going on is something of a hypocrisy test. If socialism is bad, if Obamacare is bad, if income redistribution is bad, well, how can two hundred million in corporate subsidies be good? Obama, by the way, has jumped onto the sports as socialism issue and proposed an end to federal tax subsidies for sports facilities. He's absolutely right as a matter of economic policies. We can't get our roads fixed, but we can subsidize the richest and most successful corporations in America. I don't think so.