Can someone tell me how much money does the Blazers bring in, vs how much money they're asking for.
those kinds of stats are pretty complicated and usually are presented in front of some agenda
complicated? let's say some guy named Julius, who makes big bucks moderating a Blazer fan forum while trying to keep a leash on the top dog at the forum decides to take his family to a Blazer game. So he gets his family ready, mainly by yelling at his wife, gently and with deference, to '
get-dressed-already-that-outfit-looks-as-good-as-the-other-one-geeeezuzz' and off they go. And he spends $200-300 on tickets, beverages, snacks, parking.
Now, that $200-300 would be counted as part of the "
money the Blazers bring in". But that's not enough context. Good old Julius was a Portland guy spending Portland money at a Portland venue. He could have alternately spent that $200-300 at True Value Hardware, making it part of the money True Value brings to Portland instead of the Blazers. In other words, that's not really money 'brought in', it's just local money changing hands; net neutral. Granted, it's probably better if Julius spends that money in Portland than on that secret monthly subscription to Pornhub, but a guy has to guy, right?
not only that, because of BRI formulas, out of that $200-300, only about $10-15 stays in Portland; the rest is sent to 29 other cities. But that full $200-300 gets counted as "
money the Blazers bring in" and it's mostly malarkey
something good old Julius might consider is that these economic multiplier arguments are always presented shiny side up. The other side of the coin isn't shown
an example of that: all these fucking massive Data Centers that have been built in Oregon/Washington in the shadow of the BPA. "
these data centers will be great investments bringing in thousands of jobs and leveraging economic multipliers"...at least that's what the local officials were told and armed with shiny-sided coins they dove willy-nilly into the data center business; creating tax-free enterprise zones while salivating over the incoming economic boom. And there was a big boom, temporarily, as the facilities were built. Lots of high paying construction jobs pumping money into the local economies. High Times!
but after the dust settled, it was time to examine the other side of the coin. The first thing was these data centers really don't employ that many people. For the most part they run themselves and as technology improves, especially AI tech, these centers will employ even fewer people. But that's just a drop in the bucket compared to the biggest negative impact of those centers: They are massive power hogs; in both pure electrical consumption and electrical transmission.
and the result of all that is the BPA service region, which used to have the lowest electrical rates in the nation, now has nearly the highest rates in the nation. Julius will have noticed that if he's the one who pays his families monthly electrical bill. Those data centers are good business for the corporate overlords, but they are bad business for every other electrical customer in the Northwest
and there is always another side of the coin. Now, pouring 600-650M into the 31-32 year old Moda Center probably won't have the negative impact those data centers have, but anybody who thinks there's not an un-shiny side of the coin is naive. There always is when when public money is funneled to private business.
personally, I'm opposed to this plan, mostly on principle. That's because I've gown aware of the other sides of these coins. I'm opposed to the state assuming ownership of the Moda by going into a 360M debt and when finally retiring the debt having a 52-53 year old building. I don't think there was any substantial examination of the comparative value of investing 600M in a 32 year old building vs the cost of a brand new, state of the art arena. I'm saying that as somebody with an engineering degree who has spent over 40 years in commercial and residential construction. At some point in time, as a building ages, depreciation of building value becomes a real thing, not just a tax thing. And I was opposed to the 3 governments involved embarking on this process without having any publicly stated commitment from the new owners. Now, maybe there was a private conversation but there's no indication of that. And this entire process seems like a rushed reaction to a vague innocuous comment by the NBA commissioner
I think there are probably some rocks in the road ahead. We just don't know how big the rocks are. And yeah, I know TLDR
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