Tait’s position is not actually that hard to explain or to understand. What a pity for his critics.
[Ed. note: Anaheim Mayor Tom Tait has had a letter published in today’s OC Register, which we’re reproducing here.]
It’s October and the Angels are going into post-season play with the best record in baseball. As a lifelong Angel baseball fan, I couldn’t be happier. The Angels have been part of the fabric of this community—and my family life—for decades. We’ve been season ticket holders since the stadium was built. Like all Angel fans, I do not want my hometown team to leave.
There are some in our community who would lead you to believe otherwise. It’s time to set the record straight.
There are factions in Anaheim who, in order to promote their candidate for mayor, are attempting to have residents believe that I want to drive the Angels out of town. They want you to believe that I am promoting condominium development over baseball. That’s simply untrue.
The Angels currently lease the stadium and parking lot from the City of Anaheim and the taxpayers who own the property. That lease does not expire until 2029. However, the Angels have the option to leave midway through the lease if they so choose. The lease states that if they do choose to leave, they must be out by 2016. Last September, the council majority voted to extend the deadline by three years. I voted against this move because I felt that it gave the team leverage to potentially build a stadium elsewhere or at least imply that they are.
At the same time that they voted to extend the lease, the council approved two Memorandums of Understanding, or MOUs. These two documents set the framework for negotiating a lease extension with the Angels. I didn’t vote for this framework because it was a terrible deal for the people of Anaheim. While there are many points of contention, my main points of concern are giving away the 150 acres of the parking lot surrounding the ballpark for $1/year for 66 years, shifting of responsibility to the city for maintenance of the stadium itself (currently the obligation of the Angels), and dropping “Anaheim” altogether from the team name. Over the last year, the city council did not finalize this framework into an actual lease amendment. It would have taken three votes of this same council to do so. They didn’t, and now the Angels have announced that they have terminated the terms of the framework.
Some groups in town are leading people to believe that I, as mayor, killed this deal. The Angels needed three votes for the new lease agreement—I only have one vote. So the reality is a new lease agreement that serves the interests of all stakeholders has not yet been struck. Unfortunately, instead of continuing negotiations, my political opponents on the city council and their allies have decided to play election-time politics.
This November the voters have a decision to make. You can expect lots of direct mail in the next few weeks. This propaganda will try to scare voters into voting for candidates who will rubber stamp a deal that is more beneficial to professional baseball than it is to the taxpayers of our city. As your mayor, I trust your wisdom to decide our shared future, but I want to promise you this: I will never put my political future in front of what is best for the people of Anaheim.
I am committed to continue negotiating with the Angels to attain a new framework that works for the taxpayers, the fans, the players and the owners. I am confident that we can craft such a deal.
I have every intention of taking my grandson to many baseball games here in Anaheim. But as your mayor, I will not jeopardize my grandchild’s future—or yours—by overcommitting taxpayer resources to benefit a professional sports franchise. I am a huge fan, but Anaheim’s interests will always come first.
[PIC by Vern: I was walking down Brookhurst about half a year ago
and the Mayor pulled over and asked if I needed a ride.
We had coffee at the Ball/Brookhurst Starbucks.
He was wearing an Angels cap.]
Well, you can’t get any clearer than that.
“Public servant puts community interests first.”
*This is deep…………Tait, Kring, Galloway? Which one has the Josh Hamilton Jersey? Which one has the Pujols? Which one has the Trout? Arte is probably sending them to all three candidates for Mayor. KC vs. Angels? Tough series coming up!
I’m not from around here, so help me.
The folks trying to rid of Tom are the “Mouseketeer’s”, right?
So is this a fight between Anaheim Tax payers and multiple Corporate Welfare recipients, or is there an Disney angle to this?
There’s no Disney angle other than the corporate piglets are all lined up to get a shot at the same mama sow.
Disney is getting a free $300,000,00 choo cho to drop a few visitors who might be coming from Pringle’s $200,000,000 bus barn located where nobody even wants to take a bus to or from.
Then there’s the hotel tax kickback scam of $158,000,000.
The Convention Center expansion based on completely bogus budget numbers that will pay Turner Construction tens of millions.
Moreno is just the latest “economic engine” who wants a free fill up courtesy of Anaheim’s residents.
Behind all of this philanthropy are SOAR and the Chamber of Commerce and Curt Pringle and Associates, who, oddly enough seem to be made up of almost all of the same people.
*As they said in “the Right Stuff”: “No Bucks! No Buck Rogers!” or as Donald Trump said: “The Arte of the Deal”. As Disney always says:”No Mickey Mouse and things soon get Goofy!” or “We got Tram!”
Or as I often say:
What the Hell are you talking about?
*Remember; it is always better to dummy up in room full of cash with the cops banging on the door.
Me ‘n Dan Chromolithograph:
Dan Chmielewski
After all, what else do you have to do? Nothing.
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October 2, 2014 at 8:55 pm
David Zenger
All that channeling right wing noise keeps you busy, right?
Note: It is hard to read the Cunningblog hysteria this morning without getting the sense that Dr. Moreno, while trailing Vanderbilt, is already past Murray and closing in on Eastman.
By the way: “fascism” has a technical definition in Political Science. Its “essence,” which is what FDR describes, is indeed the merger of the state with corporate governance. (One needn’t even talk about one dominating the other; the feeling is mutual.) To get full-blown fascism, you also have to see outgroup suppression and several other things — but the essence is that corporations purchase the political system, which you can see at work in Anaheim.
Nazism, incidentally, is just one variant of fascism. Mussolini’s “corporatism” is a better example of it. So calling something “fascist” is not calling it “Nazi.” Both Russia and China have arguably fascist elements these days, but China isn’t Nazi-like and Russia is — well, worrisome.
The reason that terms like oligopoly and the like don’t suffice is that they deal with market dominance rather than political dominance. An oligopoly may have dangerous private security, but it can’t make a call and have the City Attorney order someone’s arrest.