Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Worst Deal Ever

Mike Brown puts the screws to Hamilton County taxpayers once again:
The Cincinnati Bengals have asked Hamilton County taxpayers for sole ownership of the naming rights to Paul Brown Stadium.
The request – which The Enquirer obtained through a public records request – comes as the team and county haggle over how tall apartments at The Banks can be. At stake there: an 8-foot to 10-foot decorative roof ledge on a 10-story building.
So why does the team want the naming rights back? The team already would get most of the money from any naming rights deal. And just proposing the idea has caused Hamilton County commissioners to bristle.
The naming rights have long been said to be worth little to the county because the team’s lease outlines a complicated profit-sharing formula that gives the county less money from a naming rights deal as time goes on......
The Dec. 20 letter to Hamilton County Administrator Christian Sigman stemmed from Bengals concerns over the county violating agreements about the height of buildings at The Banks.
A 1996 Memorandum of Understanding sets building guidelines at the The Banks; the Bengals fear the county wants to let developers build taller structures than allowed.
While this “relates to a 10-story building that exceeds the guidelines by 8 or 10 feet, the county’s materials and the presentation to the commissioners reveal discussions of what could be a 20-story building on the same block – exceeding the guidelines by more than 100 feet and designs on blocks immediately adjacent to the stadium with building heights far exceeding the guidelines for those blocks,” Dornette wrote.
The Bengals saw the naming rights as a bargaining chip.
The letter asks that a deal – which requires an amendment to the team’s lease – be done by Dec. 31. But the county is talking with the team to explore other alternatives besides giving up naming rights, Sigman said.
That guy really has a set of stones.  And absolutely no conscience whatsoever.

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