Unsolicited bid: XL Center

[whaler11]

Educate yourself.

The XL Center runs and gets the revenue from the skyboxes and coliseum club. The school gets the revenue from ticket sales in the arena.

Unless UConn agrees to a different leasethat isn’t going to change.

I don’t have a ton of faith in Storrs but they have the leverage going forward because demand is so low in the American they don’t need access to the marginal seating vs Gampel like they have in the past.

 

[Chief00]

The XL Center runs and gets the revenue from the skyboxes and coliseum club. The school gets the revenue from ticket sales in the arena.

Unless UConn agrees to a different leasethat isn’t going to change.

I don’t have a ton of faith in Storrs but they have the leverage going forward because demand is so low in the American they don’t need access to the marginal seating vs Gampel like they have in the past.

My concern is in any conversation about XL renovation they discuss additional revenue from Premium Seating. In a renovated arena premium seating would be where season ticket holders now sit. No one is going to pay big bucks to sit up by the ceiling in today’s World. UConn is their best tenant so how can they do that without screwing the season ticket holders who make UConn Foundation donations. It’s a fair question to ask before it’s after the fact and the numbers are baked into a solution.

 

[Hoophound]

The deal is hideous. It’s more expensive than just funding the investment themselves.

You are a smart guy and I don’t read all of the CT news these days, so I won’t argue the point with you. You must see details I haven’t seen. From my distant view it looks to me like the the XL is sold to a private equity group, they make it state of the art and rent it to the state at a 5% cap with yearly inflationary rent increases. Not bad. What’s the catch?

 

[CL82]

Every day in my 5 mile drive from WeHa to Hartford, I manage to get stuck behind like 10 buses with like 15 total people in them. What's a couple more?

Maybe you should take the bus?

 

[whaler11]

You are a smart guy and I don’t read all of the CT news these days, so I won’t argue the point with you. You must see details I haven’t seen. From my distant view it looks to me like the the XL is sold to a private equity group, they make it state of the art and rent it to the state at a 5% cap with yearly inflationary rent increases. Not bad. What’s the catch?

What was floated was ‘buying it for 50’, investing 250 and then having the state pay them 7+%.

It would be much cheaper to just invest the 250 on their own.

A Ffld County firm floated a proposal to a broke public entity. Without even knowing a single detail, who do you think is going to get the better end of the deal?

If they werent extracting some margin between the investment and the ‘rent’ why would they offer the deal?

 

[whaler11]

My concern is in any conversation about XL renovation they discuss additional revenue from Premium Seating. In a renovated arena premium seating would be where season ticket holders now sit. No one is going to pay big bucks to sit up by the ceiling in today’s World. UConn is their best tenant so how can they do that without screwing the season ticket holders who make UConn Foundation donations. It’s a fair question to ask before it’s after the fact and the numbers are baked into a solution.

I wouldn’t start sweating what happens after someone invests 250 million. I don’t think it’s ever going to happen.

They will ‘sell’ the building to someone who bleeds the last 5-7 years out of it while it collapses around us.

 

[Hoophound]

What was floated was ‘buying it for 50’, investing 250 and then having the state pay them 7+%.

It would be much cheaper to just invest the 250 on their own.

A Ffld County firm floated a proposal to a broke public entity. Without even knowing a single detail, who do you think is going to get the better end of the deal?

If they werent extracting some margin between the investment and the ‘rent’ why would they offer the deal?

I get that but assumed that they would negotiate some. My thought was that in volatile times and with recession likely before long, they were looking for steady, safe places to put money.

 

[whaler11]

I get that but assumed that they would negotiate some. My thought was that in volatile times and with recession likely before long, they were looking for steady, safe places to put money.

This state negotiating against Ffld Real Estate vampires... what could go wrong!

 

[UConnStats]

Maybe you should take the bus?

No shot

 

[Excalibur]

Only if you abandon intellectual honest and change the definition of the word "use".

And if how states respond to Supreme Court decisions validates the decision, then I suppose you're also okay with the Dred Scott decision. Or just intellectually inconsistent.

I don't have to be "ok" with a decision that interprets the constitution incorrectly.

You're attempting to make a correlation where none exists. The decades of precedent didn't exist in Dred Scott, and that decision invalidated legislation (vs. Kelo upholding it) such that there was no "legislative solution" outside of a constitutional amendment.

 

[CL82]

I don't have to be "ok" with a decision that interprets the constitution incorrectly.

You're attempting to make a correlation where none exists. The decades of precedent didn't exist in Dred Scott, and that decision invalidated legislation (vs. Kelo upholding it) such that there was no "legislative solution" outside of a constitutional amendment.

Mmm, Kelo was a big jump in that it expanded the term "public use" to include seizure f/b/o a third party. IIRC Berman was probably the closest case which allowed government to plow down some "urban blight." That was probably in the '80s. There wasn't much activity between then and Kelo. You can argue that Kelo was a natural evolution, but saying that there were decades of precedent supporting taking for private use is a bridge too far.

 

[BlueMAB]

I don't have to be "ok" with a decision that interprets the constitution incorrectly.

You're attempting to make a correlation where none exists. The decades of precedent didn't exist in Dred Scott, and that decision invalidated legislation (vs. Kelo upholding it) such that there was no "legislative solution" outside of a constitutional amendment.

No I'm not. I'm making the point that judges are fallible. You're 100% okay with a decision that interprets the constitution incorrectly because you're relying on dicta set by incorrect interpretations.

Here's another bastion of right-wing conservatism criticizing the decision....and the dicta behind it.

Kelo and Precedent

 

[sledog]

The Civic Center roof didn't buckle again from snow load this winter, so who knows?

Regarding Kelo, the NL plans for it's neighborhood has been a fantastic success!!! Looks like Times Square on a Sat nite.

 

[White Dwarf]

250 mil would buy a lot of turd polish.

 

[CTBasketball]

The Civic Center roof didn't buckle again from snow load this winter, so who knows?

Regarding Kelo, the NL plans for it's neighborhood has been a fantastic success!!! Looks like Times Square on a Sat nite.

Once you kick aside the heroin needles on Bank St. the place really glows.

 

[uconnbill]

from a review of the recently released indie film, Little Pink House, about Kelo -
"The Kelo case generated a massive public reaction, with over 80% of Americans opposing the ruling, and 45 states passing reform laws intended to restrict the use of eminent domain for private development. No other case united such disparate people and groups as the NAACP, libertarian property rights advocates, Ralph Nader, and Rush Limbaugh."

you forgot conservatives as I don't know one who liked the decision and I know I didn't.

 

[freescooter]

Yeah, the ACLU is a bastion of right-wing conservatism.

The bottom line is our supreme court decided it was okay for the government to force the sale of private property for public benefit rather than public use. And yet the public didn't benefit, because that land still sits vacant today; and there's been no development leading to a boost in property taxes. So Kelo lost her house and CT homeowners lost their property rights. The only benefit to New London was whatever money was spent at local business during the production of that movie.

Dred Scott lost in court every time at every level. I suppose that means the courts are infallible right?

It wasn’t the ACLU FYI. Lots of reasons that the land sits vacant. One big one was that the lawsuit made investment impossible for several years, by which point the economy had totally changed. But really except for That house the neighborhood was a slum. Illegal conversions, 900 sf houses subdivided into 10 “apartments”. Stuff like that. Awful and dangerous. All surrounding the sewage treatment plant.

 

[BlueMAB]

It wasn’t the ACLU FYI. Lots of reasons that the land sits vacant. One big one was that the lawsuit made investment impossible for several years, by which point the economy had totally changed. But really except for That house the neighborhood was a slum. Illegal conversions, 900 sf houses subdivided into 10 “apartments”. Stuff like that. Awful and dangerous. All surrounding the sewage treatment plant.

The ACLU fought against the decision and stood with Kelo, FYI.

 

[uconnbill]

This is what's wrong with Connecticut and how it deals with the XL center and will be the downfall of it.