To me most stadiums are a perfect example of what is wrong with modern politics. We all pay taxes so that we can have needed things like schools, parks for our sanity, roads, police, fire, and regulators to keep things like polluters at bay.

Yet somehow the politicians seem to think that they can go beyond this and spend money on something that a small but enthusiastic group want yet even they get screwed in the end. In Halifax we might get 10 football games and have a 3rd rate team. Yet somehow the government will end up spending maybe 100 million in the end to make some team owners an ego palace, some developer/contractors very rich, and make the fans who are a very small percentage of the taxpaying population very happy. Those fans for some reason will also be expected to fork over a huge amount of money for tickets and then buy 7 dollar hotdogs and 10 dollar beers.

Then if it all goes tits-up the government will be expected to fully maintain the property.

Normal I would add that the athletes will be paid salaries that after a few years may very well end up being roughly what was paid for the stadium but in Halifax they will be 3rd rate players and get 3rd rate pay.

Then the city will feel that it needs to "prove" that it was a viable stadium so they will pay out millions to some music promoter who will get some big names in for a few concerts.

The last odd bit is that somehow I will end up with free tickets because the top lawfirms, the power company, the telephone company, and one of the banks will all buy VIP booths that they sometimes use to wine and dine(read bribe) our elected officials and for the lesser games one of my kid's friends(who's parents are in one of the above orgs) will give them a handful of tickets.

Or we could not spend 100 million or so and lower taxes in the city which might drive out fewer of our youth this year to places where their economies are healthy enough to afford such things.

Pretending to be like the rich does not make you rich, it makes you more poor.

The Ivany report called for 14,500 job cuts from our bloated civil service. I don't remember a section called "Give 100 million dollars to a rich guy so that he can have a new plaything."