St. Louis narrowly voted against a proposition Tuesday night that would have funded a soccer stadium and almost certainly brought an MLS team to the city.
Citizens voted for Proposition 1, which raised sales tax by half a cent on the dollar, but voted against Proposition 2, which would have allocated the money toward a new soccer stadium. Both propositions needed to pass for the stadium to receive funding.
According to @brentajones, Prop 1 has passed but Prop 2 has failed. #mls2stl pic.twitter.com/jmL8bqbMps
— Jason Rosenbaum (@jrosenbaum) April 5, 2017
According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the newly-passed Proposition 1 is expected to generate $12 million per year to be put toward public transportation expansion, which can be used by everyone. It will also generate $4 million in taxes from businesses.
Regardless of whether you want a soccer team in St. Louis, it’s clear that this was the more fiscally responsible move. This money will go toward services that are much more needed than a soccer stadium.
What will be done with that new revenue has yet to be decided, though most business use tax revenue goes toward affordable housing, public safety and building demolitions.
Mayor-elect Lyda Krewson said “there’s not a plan in place at this time” for that new money.
“We have a lot of needs in this city,” Krewson said.
While there’s a good case to be made that, among stadium deals, this was one of the most fiscally responsible deals in history, it still would have diverted future resources away from people who need them the most. The proposed SC STL claimed the stadium would create economic growth, but those plans have never actually panned out for other stadium deals.
The stadium would be financed by people who live in the less-affluent city while being mostly enjoyed by people who live in the more-affluent suburbs, even though the investors backing it certainly have the money to finance the entirety of the stadium.
Even though irresponsible publicly-financed stadiums are still popping up—looking at you, Las Vegas—more cities are turning down stadiums funded by taxpayer money. That might force the people who want to bring sports teams to cities to start considering financing those teams themselves.