Why Are The Simons Even Allowed To Bid For Management Of CIB Facilities?

There's more disturbing news about the corrupt influence the billionaire Simon family manages to exert over the City of Indianapolis. For more than a year, the family has relied on Jim "Rent A Civic Leader" Morris, Mayor Greg Ballard, the ICVA, and the CIB to do their bidding in seeking an additional $15 million a year subsidy for costs associated with Conseco Fieldhouse because the Simons claim their Pacer NBA franchise is bleeding so much money. In the wake of a state tax, spend and borrow bailout of the CIB this past year because the CIB had no money to operate Lucas Oil Stadium after it gave away all of the stadium's revenues to billionaire Colts owner Jim Irsay, the Ballard administration is considering proposals to privatize the maintenance and operation of all of the CIB's facilities. Unbelievably, the Simon's Pacers Sports & Entertainment, which is headed up by Morris, is teaming up with the ICVA and two other prominent facilities management companies, AEG and Global Spectrum, in a proposal to run the CIB's facilities. The IBJ's Peter Schnitzler pegs the four-way team as the front-runner in the bidding process.

As the children of Mel Simon wage a fight with their father's second wife over the division of his $2 billion estate, the Pacers organization has claimed the Simon family has lost hundreds of millions of dollars on its NBA franchise, even though it purchased the team for less than $20 million back in the 1980s. In 1996, the Simons got everything they demanded from the CIB for the new Conseco Fieldhouse. As Indy Tax Dollars' Fred McCarthy reminds us, then-Mayor Steve Goldsmith and the City-County Council raised the cable TV franchise fee from 3% to 5% to raise additional funds for the CIB to help pay for the new arena. The City also diverted revenues from Circle Centre Mall, which the taxpayers built but Simon Property Group is allowed to manage and operate rent free, to help pay for Conseco Fieldhouse. Mayor Goldsmith told the public the deal benefited the entire community and not just the Pacers. Goldsmith claimed the public subsidies were needed to sustain "the $1.5 billion tourist and entertainment stake in Downtown Indianapolis." Heard that one before?

Under its current lease agreement for Conseco Fieldhouse, the Pacers pay no rent but are allowed to pocket virtually all of the revenues the facility generates from both game and non-game events. Being experts in property management, the CIB assumed the Pacers could more efficiently operate Conseco Fieldhouse. Without requiring the Pacers to publicly disclose any information about its income and expenses, the CIB has been quietly negotiating how to pick up $15 million a year in additional operating expenses at Conseco Fieldhouse. Despite the Pacers' contractual obligation to pay these costs, the CIB has paid out millions of dollars to cover expenses over the past decade for Conseco Fieldhouse for which it had no legal obligation to pay. It allowed the Pacers to pocket parking revenues that righfully belonged to the CIB.

It comes as no surprise to me that the only proposal that did not include current revenues of the bidders was the one submitted by the four-way team that included the Pacers. AEG, Global Spectrum and Pacers Sports & Entertainment all declined to disclose their revenues. The ICVA, which is legally obligated to disclose its revenues as a publicly-financed nonprofit, disclosed $10 million in annual revenues. As I've said before, the Simons will never divulge this information because they know that people will be able to figure out what big fat liars they are when it comes to their claims of losing money. It also doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out which side will benefit if the Pacers are allowed to manage all of the CIB facilities. This is nothing more than a smoke and mirrors effort to give more subsidies to the billionaire Simons while making it appear that the City is finding a more efficient way to operate the CIB. They don't fool me, and I hope they don't fool you.

UPDATE: Here's a fact I overlooked. AEG was founded and is owned by Philip Anschutz, the billionaire owner of the L.A. Lakers. Anschutz, who also owns hockey teams and the Staples Center, is worth $6 billion. If the CIB hands control of the facilities to his group, the public will be contending with not one but two NBA owners calling the shots for the management of our taxpayer-financed public facilities. Hat tip to the observant reader who pointed this out to me. This may well be a concerted effort on the part of the Simons to put the squeeze on billionaire Colts owner Jim Irsay. It's no secret that the Simons are extremely jealous and envious of the deal he negotiated with the CIB for Lucas Oil Stadium. They'll be damned if they're outdone by an out-of-town pill popper who was simply lucky enough to inherit the franchise from his father.