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… Arizona is the winner.

That’s the verdict of a fact-laden analysis and history of the phenomenon by the business of sports expert Evan Weiner on the site NewJerseyNewsroom.com.

After a lengthy history of the practice, Wiener writes:

You can go virtually to every state in the union, including Alaska and Hawaii and find public dollars invested in sports. But who are the dumbest politicians in the country when it comes to sports spending? That is an easy question to answer.

Arizona.

Had the Phoenix city council been smart, which they were not, they would have approved a multi-purpose arena back in the late 1980s that would have accommodated the NBA’s Phoenix Suns and an NHL team. Instead lawmakers approved a $90 million expenditure that was designed to appease Suns owner Jerry Colangelo.

The arena was built in such a way that the building was only good for basketball and not hockey or Arena Football or indoor soccer and that severely limited the potential revenues that could be generated in the place.

Making sure they further satisfied Colangelo, the terms of the lease between the city and the NBA team required that the franchise pay the bulk of lease payments in years 36-40 of the 40-year lease agreement.

The real rent is supposed to kick in around 2028 but given the lifespan of facilities (the Miami Arena was viable for about 11 years, the Charlotte Coliseum for about 13), it is doubtful that the team will even be playing in the arena in 2028 or 2029.

He then does a case studies on all the other Valley sports facilities.

It’s not a pretty tale.