Oy! Sometimes I really have to wonder what gets into these corporations heads. As a non-profit girl, working slave wages, this really gets my goat.

As a non-American I have this question: Is this sports team the only team who would use this stadium?
Here (in New Zealand) all our stadiums are publicly owned and funded. They are uses by what ever teams want to use them, and admission covers the running costs. Maybe it is different because our major teams – like the All Blacks rugby team – are not owned by a corporation or individual, they are run by the government established rugby association and are sponsored by various businesses. Despite the millions these big guys get paid through that sponsorship they are still considered public property, so I guess maybe that is why we wouldn’t expect the stadiums to be privately owned.

I find the fact that sports teams can be OWNED in some countries amazing. I’m not against it, but like most Nzers I feel like I own the All Blacks, they are OURS. The stink that would rise up from someone buying them would be easily whiffed in your neck of the woods

Isn't that because the All Blacks are a national team though.

NZ Warriors for example would be owned by someone wouldn't they?

Tried to post this yesterday but kids got in the way. Now that I've had a day to think about it, I realize I don't know enough about how sports teams/sport arenas and stadia are funded all across Canada to comment on it with any hope of truth. I know how it's done in my city, but the fact is that with three levels of government in Canada playing hockey with the puck of taxpayers' money, it's hard to keep track of all the deals made to maintain these hugely expensive endeavours.

What irks me when I start paying attention to such (inevitably) political debates as your Seattle situation is how tempting and unfair it seems to compare funding for sports teams and funding for arts "teams." The older I get, the more I realize such comparisons are highly subjective, even from "experts."

So how do we get around comparing million dollar salaries for generally younger people with a specific combination of physical and mental prowess to thousand dollar salaries for all-aged people with a specific combination of physical and mental prowess?

And I feel I'm being generous in stating that the million dollar salaried folks are of either gender when you consider that the members of the Canadian women's hockey team do not earn million dollar salaries by any stretch of the imagination. And their relative physical and mental prowesses can be seen by one winning an Olympic gold medal, and one, well, not. So who are we rewarding here, and why?

Not that I want to start a sports discussion. I can't go much farther on this, and I had to spend some time looking up how the Canadian men's hockey team actually finished at the Olympics before I could even post this commnet.

Now this is a topic I can elaborate on. I'm involved in budgeting and planning for the minor sports programs and facilities in our town and I work out of an arena. I've been here long enough now that I know how they operate and what goes into running a successful one.

Public arenas are by definition a deficit program and in Canada they are funded by taxpayers. If the arenas did not have these tax subsidies there would not be enough money to pay for operating costs and this would mean dramatically increased costs associated with renting ice/floortime. So using arenas as an example there would most likely be no elaborate minor hockey system in place without taxpayers' funding. The other major sources of revenue for arenas and stadia are concession stands and bars. In large scale professional sports arenas the lack of direct tax revenue is offset by the HIGH price of admission and massive amounts of advertising. Most rake in money from hosting large scale events like concerts and conferences in the off season as well.

That there already are professional sporting teams in Seattle leads me to believe that the economic climate is favourable, these teams are already getting huge tax breaks and/or municipal subsidies; there had to be financial incentive to lure sports franchises there to begin with. Talk of possibly moving teams is a familiar ploy, this always seems to me like a media trick to get fans worked up so they will attend games.

Now on to Sara's question, I have a theory. There is usually very little call for violence in the performing arts and people like vicarious violence in their lives. (Think movies, arcade games, gangsta rap.) It is my opinion that people will pay so much money to see professional sports in the hopes that they'll see fighting, especially those who claim they are above the 'baser' combat sports. You rarely see blood at the opera.

People have very screwed up priorities. Doctors and teachers and policemen and the like should be paid more than what they're getting yet the government seems to throw away money on grown men playing sports... I suppose it is in their best interest to keep the people pacified and therefore distracted from what they're really doing, (think Bread and Roses,) rather than educate them and make health care services accessible to everybody.

I do understand the value of sports and what engaging in them does to children's self-esteem and sense of worth. I understand that they'll help keep you healthy and teach you leadership skills. I understand that you might even enjoy playing sports just because they are fun. But that's just it. Fun. Do we really need professional athletes? Its easy to be amazed at how physically skilled the best ones are; but what do they bring to society other than showcase an array of bad habits and excess worthy of the worst rock stars? The cult of celebrity has gotten out of hand.

Kenzie, thank you. In a couple paragraphs you sorted through the things that had me confused.

Now I'm just... tired. I have to wonder if the Sonics owner sat down one day and said, hey, let's see if I can hoodwink the common folk out of ten million or so. Worth a try. Worked before, and you can never be too rich or too caffeinated. I'll stick to the story, see what I can shake out of them.

Greed.

Marg - Thanks, thats a very good point I hadnt really thought about!

I seem to remember a similar discussion when the owner of the Mariners got the city to pay for a retractable dome for the stadium because Seattle is so rainy. However, in the summer (which is most of baseball season), Seattle actually gets less rain than Boston, which does not have a retractable dome. Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor is a cliche, but it's a cliche because it's all too true, as such examples show.