Crunching the Numbers on Erie Baseball

The Erie Time-News runs an editorial today that is so strange, I wonder if someone broke into the paper’s website. Seems the city’s AA baseball team is threatening to leave for another burg that is offering a preposterous $110 million incentive. So the editors want the city to get working on saving the team:

When -- and still attach the "if,"please -- Erie's prized Class AA franchise moves to Holyoke, Mass., Mandalay Baseball Properties won't rent the moving vans for at minimum another year. But don't doubt for a second that the clock isn't ticking.

As we pointed out Wednesday, Mandalay has been looking for a new home since the company bought the SeaWolves. This is not a secret in the baseball world, no matter how many reassurances Mandalay gives to Erie County Convention Center Authority members or anybody else.

Yes, the Convention Center Authority should sit down with Mandalay officials and figure out what it's going to take to convince the company that the Erie region is serious about addressing concerns about Jerry Uht Park. Obviously, corporate support, skyboxes, a new scoreboard and the other pricey items are on Mandalay's wish list.

… While it's likely Mandalay has privately given up on the region's ability to get help from the state, it's actually the moment when the region should be making appointments with key figures in the Rendell administration and bringing the region's legislative delegation into the discussion. The region needs state help.

How fast can local officials convince Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell that upgrading Jerry Uht Park is a top regional priority? And if it's too late to somehow reassure Mandalay that Erie can get its act together, it's exactly the right time to start preparing to woo the company and team that might eventually replace the SeaWolves. But keep this in mind: Before Harrisburg helps, some serious local financing must be identified. …

The problem with this? Too many to mention. So let’s focus on a few. Here’s what the Seawolves say about their own stadium:

A group of local business people and proponents of a new ballpark named “Team Erie” helped make this downtown facility possible by obtaining $8.7 million dollars for the stadium project. The groundbreaking ceremony took place on July 27, 1994 and the project was completed just 303 days later.” 

This is not an old stadium. It has been there for just 10 years. Worse, given interest, that $8.7 million investment would be at least, say, $10 million today. And that’s VERY conservative.

So what has Erie gotten for that investment? From the same Seawolves site: “[O]ver one million fans have passed through the gates at Jerry Uht Park to enjoy professional baseball.”

So we are looking at a subsidy of something like $10 per seat. Know how much a ticket for a box seat costs at the park? Eight dollars. And other seats are cheaper. The Times-News thinks this looks like a good deal? The Seawolves are a "prized" franchise? Try those numbers with a $110 million investment rather than $10 million.

And by the way, did supporters pitch the Jerry Uht Stadium as a 10-year fix? Or did they make huge promises about the long-term future of baseball in Erie?

One million dollars per year and still the team is leaving. God, cut them loose.

Comments

[nemo]

Erie to propose 4 million for Seawolves. The Erie county council, proboble new Erie mayor will, with state & congress. officials announce Aug. 1 to come up with $$$ to meet mandalay demands. At least 4 million in bond issues to support the picnic area and new scoreboard to start. They hav efell for the bait. Mandaly would not have been able to go much of anywhere. The holyoke mass deal would have taken acouple years ,so no where else to go for now. A lot of coomuniteis just cant afford to finance these types of projects anymore and every fefw years have their arms twisted fo more.

[nemo]

Erie to propose 4 million for Seawolves. The Erie county council, proboble new Erie mayor will, with state & congress. officials announce Aug. 1 to come up with $$$ to meet Mandalay demands. At least 4 million in bond issues to support the picnic area and new scoreboard to start. They have fell for the bait. Mandalay would not have been able to go much of anywhere. The holyoke mass deal would have taken acouple years ,so no where else to go for now. A lot of coommunities just cant afford to finance these types of projects anymore and every few years have their arms twisted fo more.

[nemo31]

Erie County Council did pass the bond issue for improvements at Uht Stadium. Four million dollars worth. They also passed a Fourty eight million dollar bond to have a private hotel built for the new convention center. The convention center itself was paid for entirely by the state. The hotel is a Sheraton with the franchise owner a company called White Realties. Together they have assets of $16 billion. Throw in Mandalay the owner of the Seawolves worth couple billion dollars. Yet our local newspaper is concerned Erie should be more business friendly. Then again the local powers to be more than likely invested in them.

Gov. Rendell just committed $750,000 a year to support the shortfalls of the Convention Center/Private Hotel. That on top a 4% hotel room tax.The local hotel group is at this moment in a court with the hotel deal. They are upset. They feel the taxpayers are funding their competition. I agree.

[nemo31]

The local hotel people lost their case. The judge said thet could not prove this would hurt them $$$ wise. He did state the court action brought out some short falls how local government does business.

[D. Connolly]

You must be a journalist since your facts are wrong and your financial analysis is childish.

Holyoke, MA is NOT offering $110 million to Mandalay. Mandalay is proposing a $110 million development that would center on a new, taxpayer-funded ballpark. Mandalay's model is to develop or redevelop land around a new ballpark. They will not do this without public subsidies such as tax incremental financing, tax abatements, or other schemes.

You fail (conveniently omit?) to talk about the economic impact of the 240,000 fans that attend games each year in Erie. Millions of dollars have been spent in downtown Erie as a result of baseball which has easily returned the modest investment made by the Commonwealth.

The Pittsburgh Pirates should have been the team cut loose from Pennsylvania. The obscene amount of taxpayer money wasted to build PNC Park for the worst franchise in major league baseball will never generate revenue in associated development, ticket sales, or taxes near what it cost to build that Taj Mahal. Hell, maybe we wouldn't have had to pay for a new home for the Steelers if the Pirates had been relocated to a city that supports baseball. What was wrong with Three Rivers Stadium anyway?

Think of all the things the Commonwealth could have financed with the money wasted on PNC Park and Heinz Field, not to mention Philadelphia’s sports facilities.

[D. Connolly]

Make that tax revenue on associated development and ticket taxes. Of course, Pirates ownership keeps the ticket revenue and uses that to sign quality free agents.