Vikings Stadium Poll Results Explain a Lot #wilfare
Survey USA’s polling of registered voters reinforces what we already know about Vikings stadium Wilfare sentiment: Minnesotans support the team until the team asks for Minnesotans to cover the majority of new stadium construction costs. While people may want a new stadium, they don’t want it enough to spend their on money.
Interestingly, the most popular idea among people polled was to renovate the Metrodome. That’s an idea I’ve mentioned here before. Vancouver’s BC Place is the model for that. They did that with their Metrodome style stadium last year for $554 million, so 1/2 the cost of building a 21,000 car parking lot (plus stadium) in Arden Hills, and more than $300 million cheaper than building a new stadium at the Metrodome site from the ground up.
Perhaps this is starting to sink in?
Vikings Fans Share of Wallet
The latest Ramsey County stadium financing proposal illustrates how greedy Zygi Wilf’s NFL franchise has become.
Ramsey County’s new plan would raise $5.4 million in parking fees from non-game events and $2 million in naming rights to parking lots. A 3 percent admissions surcharge would be included.
Bagley said the team needs the parking fees for operational costs and he said the ticket surcharge specifically was ruled out in the initial county deal.
In a nutshell, any stadium funding idea that puts the burden on fans is a non-starter for the Vikings because it cuts into how much money the Vikings can extract from fans.
Why should the public build a parking lot on the Wilf’s behalf where the Wilf’s pocket the parking revenues? Why shouldn’t the county use a ticket surcharge to cover some of their costs? Because Zygi wants that money.
Here are a few additional questions Survey USA could poll the public on to get a feel for Viking stadium Wilfare sentiment:
– Were the public to pay for a stadium parking lot, should revenues from the parking lot go to the public or Zygi Wilf?
– Were the public to pay for the majority of a stadium’s cost, what percentage of revenue from stadium naming rights should go to the public?
– Should revenue from Personal Seat Licenses go toward reducing the public’s share of a stadium deal or increasing Zygi Wilf’s profitability?
– Should a Vikings stadium be subject to property taxes, or should home owners and other local businesses subsidize the Vikings through their own property taxes?
– If a stadium costs Y, and the Vikings are willing to pay Z, Y – Z = X. What percentage of X should be paid by Vikings fans, and how much should be paid by the public through taxation?
