05-31-2014, 05:42 PM
Lemon Drop wrote:
comments like that just make you sound uninformed about Allen's philanthropy.
publicly funded stadiums and private philanthropy are different things.
The existence of one doesn't trump the power of the other.
I disagree. Art Modell here in Baltimore got a bunch of public money for the Ravens and then was lauded as a great philanthropist. But if you look at his publicly known donations and compare it to the tax payer money funneled into his team, there seemed to be more money coming from the people to the team than vice versa. My concern is that maybe communities should take hundreds of millions of dollars and pour them into the community and see if that offsets the philanthropy of any specific billionaire team owner.
Not going to knock someone truly striving to do good, but it sure is easier to give a fraction of the money back that is coming to you. Paul Allen may not be the best example. Hypothetically, let's say a wealthy patron donates $5 million per year to the community. In 40 years he would have given $200 million dollars away. On the flip side any publicly funded stadium will have cost two or more times as much. Then we have to examine any employment and tax benefits from the stadium versus the same if the tax money had simply been invested into the community.
Last time I read a steady about such public sports investments, it tended to have a negative effect. However, I would to see more data points.