Opinion: Dear Rays, Montreal won't pay for your new stadium
Montrealers are happy to welcome new neighbours with a bagel basket or a case of beer, but we’re not buying them a new hot tub.
That’s how taxpayers in Montreal feel about the Tampa Bay Rays. They sure seem like a great team. We’d love to see them play some games in Montreal. But we’re not going to let them treat themselves to our wallets just so they can build a shiny new stadium.
The first problem is that it doesn’t make sense to build a whole new stadium for half of a ball season.
What’s currently being negotiated between Tampa Bay Rays owner Stuart Sternberg and Montreal billionaire Stephen Bronfman would be a team-sharing agreement. If it were to happen, the Rays would play half the season in Tampa Bay -- presumably in the Tropicana Field -- and half the season in a new stadium near downtown Montreal.
A part-time team is unprecedented, but building half a stadium is impossible. It’s not like you can build everything up until second base and call it quits.
And building those facilities can get outrageously expensive. The three major league ballparks built in the last decade cost anywhere between $630 million and $1.2 billion each. That’s a lot of money to spend on a facility that would be used for about 40 games per year.
Then, there’s the whole question of the economic benefits.
Even with a full-time team, the case for stadium subsidies doesn’t add up.
Economists have looked into it time and time again, under different ownership and subsidy structures. Their results are nearly unanimous that there’s no substantial evidence of positive economic impacts associated with spending taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars on new professional-sports facilities.
When top economists, including Nobel prize winners and former U.S. presidential advisors for both parties were asked about it, only four per cent of them found that taxpayers might gain more than they lose when their money is used to subsidize pro-sports facilities.
What about the tourism and the new jobs you ask? A study on the taxpayer-funded $225-million Camden Yards in Baltimore pegged the net annual economic benefit to the area at $3 million. That’s hardly worth the money, and that’s with a full-time team.
So, the economic case simply isn’t there to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on it.
But there’s also a matter of priorities.
The province of Quebec, where Montreal is located, just doesn’t have hundreds of millions of bucks lying around. Taxpayers already owe more than $50,000 each for the debt our provincial and federal governments have accumulated over the years.
And even if we did have the money, building a new ballpark would rank below fixing our roads, supporting our ailing health-care system or lowering what is the heaviest tax burden in North America.
That’s why, when taxpayers were polled on this question, 60 per cent of them were opposed to subsidizing baseball in Montreal.
If the Rays want to come and play in Montreal, we’ll be sure to give them a warm Canadian welcome. But they need to know that taxpayers’ wallets are off limits.
Renaud Brossard is the Quebec Director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
-- This article was first published in the Tampa Bay Times on Oct. 27, 2021.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
'It could be catastrophic': Woman says natural supplement contained hidden painkiller drug
A Manitoba woman thought she found a miracle natural supplement, but said a hidden ingredient wreaked havoc on her health.
After hearing thousands of last words, this hospital chaplain has advice for the living
Hospital chaplain J.S. Park opens up about death, grief and hearing thousands of last words, and shares his advice for the living.
WHO likely to issue wider alert on contaminated cough syrup
The World Health Organization is likely to issue a wider warning about contaminated Johnson and Johnson-made children's cough syrup found in Nigeria last week, it said in an email.
Canada, G7 urge 'all parties' to de-escalate in growing Mideast conflict
Canada called for 'all parties' to de-escalate rising tensions in the Mideast following an apparent Israeli drone attack against Iran overnight.
'It was all my savings': Ontario woman loses $15K to fake Walmart job scam
A woman who recently moved to Canada from India was searching for a job when she got caught in an online job scam and lost $15,000.
Families to receive Canada Child Benefit payment on Friday
More money will land in the pockets of some Canadian families on Friday for the latest Canada Child Benefit installment.
After COVID, WHO defines disease spread 'through air'
The World Health Organization and around 500 experts have agreed for the first time on what it means for a disease to spread through the air, in a bid to avoid the confusion early in the COVID-19 pandemic that some scientists have said cost lives.
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer denied bail after being charged with killing Canadian couple
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer, one of two men charged in the killings of a Canadian couple in Dominica, has been denied bail.
DEVELOPING G7 warns of new sanctions against Iran as world reacts to apparent Israeli drone attack
Group of Seven foreign ministers warned of new sanctions against Iran on Friday for its drone and missile attack on Israel, and urged both sides to avoid an escalation of the conflict.