Two days before Tuesday’s crucial council vote, a lengthy Journal cover story analyzes Winston-Salem’s proposed downtown stadium deal, in the process drawing a comparison to Greensboro’s stadium deal:
Supporters of the project point to the ballpark built in Greensboro in 2005 as a reason for building a new stadium here, but Prim’s request for public money highlights a clear difference between this stadium project and the one in Greensboro.
In the Greensboro stadium deal, Guilford County spent the equivalent of less than $7 million and got both a new downtown stadium and a new home for its Social Services Department, and a non-profit agency raised the money needed for the ballpark.
That project was cemented thanks to a sizable grant by the Joseph M. Bryan Foundation.
Mayor Allen Joines said he thought about asking local char-
itable groups for money for a new stadium here. But organizations such as the Winston-Salem Foundation do not make the types of grants that came from the Bryan Foundation for the Greensboro stadium.
The largest single contribution that the Winston-Salem Foundation, an organization with $272 million in total assets, has ever given out was $2 million. And it was granted over time, not in a lump sum.
“The foundations that we have access to, their mission is narrow. They simply don’t have the capacity to do it,” Joines said.
Meanwhile, Forsyth County has pretty much said it’s not going to fork out the full $14 million Prim is requesting. Making matters worse is the fact that Prim still remains secretive about his finances. His sweet deal could be going, going. gone. Tuesday night will be very interesting.
