Seemingly out of nowhere, Downtown Plaza is being touted as a good site to build an arena for the Sacramento Kings. It’s kind of bizarre how this idea has taken on a life of its own as the threat of the Kings’ leaving Sacramento has intensified.
Can you imagine ripping up a wide swathe of downtown and turning it into a construction zone for a couple of years? The mall is surrounded by buildings north, south and east, and the freeway just to the west is always heavy with traffic. Daily commuters would face a bottleneck for a couple of years and fans would grapple with one every time they went to an event. Relatively little parking would be available in underground lots and light rail has a modest following in car-crazy Sacramento.
The railyard site just north of downtown, which Mayor Kevin Johnson touted for a year, was almost as bad in terms of future access, but its more open setting would have meant less daily headache for a commuters and less demolition mess with complicated infrastructure problems.
So why is Mayor Johnson now leading the parade for a bizarre mall arena?
Oops, he isn’t. The mayor, the fellow elected by voters to lead the city, is taking a back seat to billionaires, hailed as “whales” in the local media, who are trying to chart the course the city takes for the next 50 years. I suppose this isn’t too strange, given that Johnson failed to realize that the Kings could be bought for the right price.
Still, I find it unsettling to read in the Sacramento Bee that billionaire Ron Burkle has seen fit to discuss building a new Kings arena at Downtown Plaza during a recent closed-door meeting with NBA Commissioner David Stern.
Doesn’t it seem strange that an outside moneybags like Burkle feels comfortable trying to work a deal with the NBA regarding the future of Sacramento? Isn’t it odd that City Manager John Shirey, according to the same story, is now preparing to study how an arena could fit at the mall? How many thousands of dollars is he planning to spend this time for an arena feasibility study? Has he talked to the City Council? What are the views of council members?
You would think that the local media, which like to fancy themselves watchdogs of the public interest, would do some independent investigation into who’s running the city and who stands to benefit most from a Downtown Plaza arena.
Why is Burkle attracted to Downtown Plaza? What does fellow “whale” Mark Mastrov think? What game plan does JMA Venture, the mall’s owner, have? It has already commissioned its own arena study.
Unfortunately, the watchdog media seem obsessed with whale watching and arena fantasies. The headline in Sunday’s Bee read “Arena at Plaza possible win-win.”
The headline could as easily have said “Arena at Plaza possible lose-lose” if the Bee had wanted to ask some hard questions.
I think this posturing, and grandstanding, by the Mayor, and it’s
weekly press conferences, is a set up for what’s coming in the next
2 years.
An expansion team ?
At this point the City is running out of time ?
It’s not possible for this whole package to be done
in the next couple of months.
There is a lot more technicality coming before this comes to fruition.
The environmental study takes about a year, Then a vote from the City council
comes next.
I’m sorry.
The city is playing catch up with Seattle.
The catch up gap is so enormous at this time that it is hard to
catch up with it.
I have not heard of how much money these guys are will be. Put in the keep the team in Calif. just a lot of talk. No action!!!! The guy wants to build the arena and charge for rent to the Kings. but does not want to buy the team out right.Seattle got approval to build the arena and all the money. Your Mayor is only worried about his election bid and keeping his job.i would like to see how much money each owner will put in.I hear of a lot of talk but no action.
Paul,
You are possibly the most negative, stupidest and uninformed Sacramentan. Ever heard of the 911 site in New York? Wonder what magic they are employing in rebuilding several blocks of their city….It is only one of the busiest cities on the planet. I am just amazed at your stupidity. Sacramento Bee has reached a new low…you should not be allowed to read a blog; let alone write on one!
Hey Jordan, Ever heard of Sacramento’s almost $2 billion debt? That’s make a fellow negative about giving away millions to billionaires.
You are trying to tie 2 unrelated events into a single issue. Assume for a second the arena is not built on any taxpayer money, how does the $2 billion debt go away?
For one thing, Jordan, it doesn’t increase by $255 million.
It will be more than that, probably half a billion.
…it’s especially a ‘lose-lose’ of Sacramentans must cough up the nearly $1 billion price tag….infrastructure included… while the city remains at least $2 billion in debt due to pension and other long term liabilities, as well as another $2.5 billion in necessary infrastructural improvements for water and sewer, whilst the city’s basic services rot…
How much will the “whales” be contributing to this project? More importantly, how much will the city contribute? The “whale” is not a good metaphor for the Mayor to use. I keep thinking of “Moby Dick” in which nearly everyone on the Pequod dies after that ship encounters the giant whale, after captain and crew of that ship hunted the white whale for years. I hope Sacramento won’t become the Pequod.
I like the literary analogy, Jason.
In his press conference this morning, the Mayor hopes that Sacramento is the final resting place for the Kings. A final resting place is a tomb or a crypt. I guess the Kings are laid to rest once we encounter the whales.