Call it death by a thousand cuts. The Maryland Stadium Authority wants $150,000 to study ways to put the state?s sports stadiums to better use. In the scheme of a $31.5 billion state budget, it is a small sum. But it is yet another example of how taxpayers end up footing the bill for a $1.4 billion deficit.
We?ve outlined millions the state has lost to waste and fraud at multiple agencies as identified by Department of Legislative Services audits.
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Legislators should deny the request along with the rest of the money destined for the MSA and stop wasteful spending line item by line item. This particular cut should be a no-brainer.
The MSA perpetually loses money and needs Baltimore City and state support to cover its operating expenses ? despite being a reputed engine of “economic development.” Last year state and local governments contributed about $24 million to support its activities. Self-sponsored economic impact studies not surprisingly always show the agency supporting thousands of jobs and raising millions in local and state tax revenue. But they do not include the costs of paying overtime for Baltimore City police at stadium events, which the teams do not fully cover.
And as sports economist Dennis Coates of University of Maryland Baltimore County wrote in these pages last year, “the tax revenues (from Oriole Park at Camden Yards and M&T Bank Stadium) are roughly equivalent to the costs of the debt service. They do not, therefore, indicate net benefits to the city and state from the football and baseball stadiums.”
The fact that stadium officials and Chairman Frederick Puddester would even ask for money for a study in these budget times indicates their incompetence. Isn?t it obvious that booking more events at all the stadiums would help to ease the financial pain delivered in part by lower attendance at Orioles games this year? This is a time to hustle, not to navel-gaze.
The agency projects revenues of $11.6 million in fiscal 2009. Let it match its expenses to its revenues through innovation and hard work like businesses do.
