Voice of Utah

Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon 1, Good Old Boys Network 0. It must feel strange to the South Valley boys (Sandy Mayor Tom Dolan and House Speaker Greg Curtis) to be told No for once. If former mayor Nancy Workman were still in office, she and Dolan would have smooched their way to a deal so fast that ReAl Salt Lake would have been 40 minutes into their Sandy debut before the rest of us could ask, "Who paid for this?"

In the interest of appearing relatively disinterested, we'll start with a snippet of Governor -- er, we mean Mayor -- Corroon's rationale for declining to buy the land for a ReAL stadium. Then we'll admit why we didn't care what the reasons were. Corroon wrote:

My reasons for my decision are as follows:

1. The project as presented does not demonstrate that it is clearly financially viable. While I respect the experience of Dave Checketts in sports management and event promotion, even fairly optimistic but realistic projections show that the team would lose money. Therefore, I believe this is an unsafe investment for the public.

2. The amount of debt required for this project would put RSL in default with only minor shortfalls in ticket sales.

Okay, whatever. We trust you. Which brings us to our reasons for refusing to make any pretense of objectivity on this issue: Our complete distrust of the other parties involved. We're not against public funding for sports venture per se. Although mentions in local media seemed rather scarce during this debate, we both remember Larry Miller getting 20+ million for the land under the Delta Center. But apart from other differences, that transaction was above board. Not so with ReAL. Consider:

In 2005, Salt Lake City was tricked into contributing $8 out of $20 million to expand parking at the SouthTowne Expo in Sandy. Sandy City did not kick in anything. Sandy then said it wanted to use the $20 million for a garage across the street to share with ReAL, as part of its enticement to the team. "If they're going to use Salt Palace expansion money to purchase land for the soccer stadium, I just think that's wrong and is contrary to the representations that were made to us and the deal that was made by Salt Lake City," Salt Lake City Council Chair Dale Lambert told the D-News in October 2005. "I suppose our only recourse is to outline the facts so that the public is well aware of what happened." Lambert called it a "betrayal" of trust, and that's how it seemed to us.

Dolan and ReAL part-owner Dave Checketts knew all along that they intended to use hotel tax money on this project, but concealed their plan. If one looks back at quotes from Checketts, he often made assurances that "Utah taxpayers" would not be burdened, then later claimed it wasn't a lie because the hotel tax is paid mostly by non-Utahns. (However, hotel taxes would go to other local projects if they weren't funneled into the soccer deal, so Checkett's claim was disingenuous either way.) As the November 2005 election approached, the D-News and others repeatedly asked whether tax money would be involved, but Checketts and Dolan refused to give an honest answer.

Mayor Dolan's re-election was in trouble. A hot citizens' referendum against rezoning the "Gravel Pit" for a Wal-Mart was creating considerable Anybody-But-Dolan momentum. Dolan and Checketts timed the announcement that Sandy had been "awarded" the franchise for shortly before the election, at which time Dolan told a city official, "This is going to save me." Even after the announcement, Dolan and Checketts continued to dodge questions about whether taxpayer money would be involved.

When the state legislature thought Salt Lake City might land the ReAL, it passed a law prohibiting cities from using Redevelopment Agency (RDA) money on sports stadiums. But when Speaker Greg Curtis's home town later became the likely situs, the hypocritical body reversed itself and allowed RDA money (which would otherwise go to school districts) to be used on stadiums.

For once, Dolan's back-door politics backfired on him. Apparently not expecting to be questioned, Checketts lashed out at the County's legitimate requests for documentation, calling Corroon "the King of England," claiming that Corroon was playing politics, and just generally throwing temper tantrums. Many of us would have tossed Checketts out on his ear right then, but not Corroon. He plodded ahead, hiring a consultant and appointing a committee, and even made a convincing argument on Doug Fabrizio's show for why the stadium could be a sound investment for the county.

We're glad that Peter Corroon is a stand up guy who didn't let Checketts' and Dolan's sleaziness keep him from evaluating this deal fairly. He's a better person than we are.