Texas Transit Association

If Jerry Jones expects the public to buy him a new football stadium, he had better avoid this question: Does Dallas County have a better way to spend $425 million? Maybe to improve its weakest schools. Or revitalize downtown. Or fix the ailing public hospital system. The county’s wish list is a long one, and somewhere, there’s a place for a Dallas Cowboys stadium. The problem for the Cowboys owner is that most residents wouldn’t put it near the top of the pecking order.

Is a new stadium worth the price?
By Mitchell Schnurman
Star-Telegram Staff Writer May 02, 2004

Jones saw that firsthand in 1996, when he tried to persuade Irving voters to pull out of DART, the region’s mass transit system. His failure then is worth recounting now because it shows that people will go only so far to support a sports team — at least when they recognize the real trade-offs.

The Cowboys seem oblivious to the lesson. On Thurs-day, the team proposed a $650 million stadium in Fair Park, with public money covering two-thirds of the cost.

The move has already turned off some Dallas leaders, and that’s not usually a recipe for winning an election.

Jones seemed to have a better chance of success eight years ago, when he was pushing big changes in Irving. He wanted residents to reject DART so Irving could free up 1 cent in sales tax revenue, enough to renovate Texas Stadium and add a retractable roof.

Jones financed nearly all the anti-DART campaign and even pledged to provide buses so Irving residents could still get around town. The bus contract would have cost him $3.3 million.

He still got slapped down. In a huge turnout, 57 percent of voters chose mass transit over a sharper venue for the football team.

It was a great call by the great unwashed.

Mass transit is gaining a foothold in the area, offering a bit of relief for some of the country’s worst air pollution and traffic snarls. And Irving is a key part of the progress.

The Trinity River Express, a rail line connecting Fort Worth to Dallas, picks up 2,700 passengers a day at two stations in Irving. The city also has a major bus transit center, and 131,000 bus trips ran through Irving in March.

Irving is slated to get a light rail line within a decade to link it to Dallas/Fort Worth Airport and downtown Dallas. The line is expected to bisect Las Colinas, a top business center, and is almost certain to spur development.

On the eastern side of Dallas County, light rail has attracted $1.3 billion in private investments, including lofts, retailers and offices. Irving will get its share of that in the future, but the debate is already settled: More people in Irving are better off because the public stayed with mass transit and rejected what Jones wanted.

No one will suggest that potential Cowboys money should go to mass transit now because DART already has 13 cities participating. But residents should vet Jones’ offer with the same critical eye and ask: Is this a wise way to use tax dollars?

Some cities might argue that it is, even if independent studies show that new stadiums don’t justify the public cost.

Nashville, Tenn., and St. Louis, for instance, wanted to show the world that they belonged in the big leagues, so they went after NFL teams. To lure them, they paid all the costs of the new stadiums.

The city of Arlington used a similar pitch to get voters to pay for two-thirds of The Ballpark in Arlington. Being home to the Texas Rangers was supposed to elevate Arlington’s status as a tourist haven, but it also created a backlash among voters.

Residents consistently rejected proposals in the years that followed, including measures for mass transit, a Smithsonian museum and improvements to Johnson Creek. Such a reaction isn’t uncommon, economists say, because tax increases become more painful as they accumulate.

The public also expects politicians to put the most important issues first. If they use up their political goodwill on a stadium, it can be tough to go back for help on parks or health care.

That’s how it played out in Arlington and, on some levels, in Dallas. Voters in Dallas narrowly approved a tax increase for the American Airlines Center in 1998, helping a couple of wealthy sports owners.

The public aid became a rallying cry for Laura Miller, now serving her second term as mayor. Under Miller, City Council members rejected any help for developers around the AAC, even though an elaborate proposal was enticing.

Pro sports can help a community feel better about itself, and a pair of economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City say that may be the only meaningful payoff.

That angle doesn’t apply to the Cowboys because the team is already here. And area residents will feel the pride of ownership whether the team plays in Irving or Fair Park.

Unlike Nashville and St. Louis, the big issue for Dallas-Fort Worth isn’t getting national attention; it’s getting the right kind.

Miller was right when she campaigned on the theme of improving the area’s quality of life: helping schools, sprucing up parks, fixing roads, cutting air pollution.

How many people flee North Texas because the sports facilities are lame?

If taxpayers build a new palace for the Cowboys, it might bring a Super Bowl here — once. Maybe Dallas will get into the college championship rotation.

But it won’t develop smarter workers or attract growing companies or persuade people to move here.

The Alliance corridor does some of that. So do Sundance Square and downtown Fort Worth.

Public money played an important part in those developments. Alliance got $167 million in federal, state and city funds, and millions more in tax abatements for companies. Today, the Alliance area has 20,000 jobs, and it generated $54 million in property taxes in 2002.

Sundance Square got $10 million in public help, with the rest of downtown receiving about $300 million, primarily for highway improvements. Fort Worth is now considered one of the best places to live, and people are flocking to apartments and condos downtown.

It may not seem fair to ask a Cowboys stadium to measure up to mass transit or Alliance or downtown Fort Worth.

But it’s as fair as Jerry Jones asking for $425 million.