Ballard's Arguments For CIB Bailout Don't Hold Up

If you want to see a good example of why Mayor Greg Ballard's plan to bail out the CIB to the tune of $47.5 million a year isn't selling with the public, check out Ballard's performance at the Mayor's Night out in Lawrence on April 21. You can view the video of the meeting by clicking here.

When questioned about the CIB at public meetings, Mayor Ballard demonstrates a lack of patience with the people posing the questions. His performance at the Lawrence meeting was no different. He begins by telling his audience that the CIB bailout has nothing to do with the Colts or Pacers. "It's about the downtown and the convention business," he says. "It's about the huge economic engine that downtown represents to the city and to the state." He then cites statistics claiming downtown retail--thanks to the convention business--generates $220 million in sales taxes, $3.5 billion in gross receipts and 66,000 jobs. "75% of the retail sales generated from Circle Centre Mall come from out-of-town visitors." "That's what this is all about," he claims. "This downtown was all planned out 30-40 years ago," Ballard says. "It's all connected." "Every business leader I speak to in this city says the same thing." "We don't want to set off a row of dominos falling and hurt the convention business." "I inherited this mess."

Where to begin with the Mayor's circular reasoning. First of all, saying that it has nothing to do with the Pacers or Colts doesn't change the facts. The CIB has said from the outset of this debate that $20 million of its annual deficit has resulted from the higher costs of operating and maintaining Lucas Oil Stadium. The CIB has decided on its own that it needs to absorb $15 million in annual costs the Simons claim their Pacers team is currently picking up to operate Conseco Fieldhouse. Together, these two items represent $35 million of the supposed $47.5 million deficit. How can you claim, Mr. Mayor, that the deficit has nothing to do with the Pacers or Colts? The Mayor insists the Pacers are losing money. "There's no question about that." The Pacers have never been required to provide audited financial statements that would support their claim that they are losing money. If the Mayor claims he knows they are losing money, he offers that opinion based on information that has never been shared publicly to verify the claim. I also observe that the Mayor boasts about the revenues generated from Circle Centre Mall without acknowledging the $320 million public contribution to its construction and the fact that the Simons are allowed to operate it for their private benefit without paying a dime in rent to the City.

The Mayor's arguments completely fall apart when he tries to rope in the convention industry into the argument for the bailout. When questioned by a relentless citizen at the Lawrence meeting, he returned to his common meme that the Pacers and Colts provide a national and international presence for Indianapolis. In other words, but for their presence, groups would not come to Indianapolis to host their conventions. That's total bull, and if he doesn't understand that, then he needs to do some more homework on this issue.

When a citizen asked Mayor Ballard what he planned to do to make the CIB more accountable, he once again became defensive. He boasted that all of the CIB's meeting are now open to the public. Theoretically, the Board's meetings have always been open to the public. Nothing has changed here. It's what gets decided ex parte that sticks in the crawl of the taxpaying public. Ballard notes that the CIB now has a website at which the public can access information. As far as the Mayor is concerned, there is nothing more the CIB can do to make it more accountable to the public than what it has already done. Another citizen asked Mayor Ballard when he was going to replace the current CIB leadership and Board. "That's a good question," he replied without answering the question.

At one point, Ballard said he recently spoke to former Mayor Bart Peterson about the CIB mess. Peterson's administration signed the lease with the Colts for LOS knowing that the CIB had no additional money to cover the costs of operating and maintaining the new stadium. "Great, Greg. Your options range from bad to awful," Ballard quoted Peterson as telling him. Peterson's solution at the time for covering those costs was to either build a downtown casino or allow the CIB to use food and beverage tax revenues intended to pay down the debt on the bonds issued for the construction of LOS. Gov. Daniels and the legislature nixed both of those ideas. Instead, the state decided to build the stadium using a state-created stadium authority. The state left it to the City of Indianapolis to figure out how it was going to cover the costs of its lease agreement with the Colts. Mayor Ballard's solution is to raise taxes on such things as admissions, hotels, car rentals and alcohol, and to capture more of the state revenues generated within the downtown by expanding the professional sports development area.

Mayor Ballard can make most of the CIB's deficit go away with two simple solutions. Tell the Pacers the taxpayers can't afford to subsidize its team to the tune of $15 million a year more. The lease agreement the team negotiated requires it to pay for the operating and maintenance expenses on Conseco Fieldhouse. The CIB, nonetheless, has paid expenses over the last decade that the Pacers were legally obligated to pay. Also, the Pacers aren't sharing with the CIB all of the parking revenues the team is legally obligated to share with the City. Pay up, now. As for LOS, the CIB doesn't own it. It belongs to the state. If the CIB can't afford its lease deal with the Colts, then it needs to turn it back over to the state to operate. The CIB leaders are demanding a statewide and regional solution to the CIB's funding mess. That would go a long way towards solving the CIB's funding problem. Stop insulting our intelligence by insisting, Mr. Mayor, that this has nothing to do with the Pacers and Colts and has everything to do with the convention business. Your CIB solution is all about holding the downtown convention business hostage until the two teams get everything they want, the taxpaying public be damned. That's not what you were elected to do.