Be Happy About This

The renogotiated deal between Gateway and the Indians + Cavs is a good story from a sports perspective, but it's better from a taxpayer perspective -- there's no doubt that if Gateway had remained stuck under the original deal it would have cost local taxpayers at least 10 million bucks, and perhaps more. The details of the new deal still seem a little unclear to me, but it sounds like the teams have let Gateway off the hook for ongoing repairs in exchange for keeping all revenue from lodges and ticket sales. In the Cavs case, it's a matter of freeing Gateway from 9.5 million in debt in exchange for the prospect of keeping more of the money made from the LeBron-years. But the bottom line is that the original deal was a joke, and this one makes a bit more sense. Though it's worth remembering that in either case the Gateway project remains a taxpayer subsidy to these two sports teams.