Well, here we are — ready to help Don Beaver build a baseball stadium Uptown just as our revolving-door courthouse down the street spews out more criminals into the city. For anyone still keeping count, that is a $7.8 million direct “infrastructure” subsidy to the stadium and basically a $28 million gift of the Third Ward land.
Better still there is the certitude that Mecklenburg County and the city of Charlotte will be sued for using proceeds from the 2004 Third Ward park bond to help pay for a baseball stadium. As Commissioner Bill James notes, stadium backers and county officials are already playing fast and loose with the facts of this matter.
So fast and loose that what was a $300,000 expense for non-site specific soil erosion control on Wednesday — per assistant county manager Bobbie Shields’ statement at a public policy hearing — has by today become a $300,000 baseball stadium expense that was paid for out of bond money and will have to be re-paid with other county, non-bond money. Got that?
This pot of money, that pot of money, the other pot of money. Always going to Whitewater Centers, Arts Towers, Halls of Fame, Uptown Arenas, and, now, finally waaay on the bottom of the Center City Partners checklist — an Uptown baseball stadium.
Makes you wonder who the real crooks might be..
