We feel compelled to weigh in on the Cleveland Browns discussion around the move to suburban Brook Park. We are very baffled by Mayor Bibb’s response to Browns’ owners Dee and Jimmy Haslam’s public statement this week that they will “…focus on making a dome stadium and adjacent development in Brook Park” where Bibb lamented being “deeply, deeply disappointed” in a City Hall news conference.
One of Bibb’ primary jobs as mayor is to enforce the law (at which, we submit he’s a bit challenged given his lack of effective real-time response to the 16 street takeovers a few weeks ago that has become a major public embarrassment for the city).
There is a law in place, Section 9.67 of the Ohio Revised Code, “Restrictions on owner of professional sports team that uses a tax-supported facility,” sometimes called the “Art Modell Law” enacted after Art Modell moved the Browns from Cleveland to Baltimore in the mid 90s. The law actually gives the City of Cleveland the upper hand here and the law must be enforced. If Bibb fails to enforce the law, he is abdicating his duty as mayor, and with an election roughly one year away, he would be foolish to do so. Elections aside, he will always be best known as the mayor who lost the Browns despite a law on the books that prevented such a loss.
The law states:
Ohio Revised Code Section 9.67 - Restrictions on owner of professional sports team that uses a tax-supported facility. Effective June 20, 1996.
No owner of a professional sports team that uses a tax-supported facility for most of its home games and receives financial assistance from the state or a political subdivision thereof shall cease playing most of its home games at the facility and begin playing most of its home games elsewhere unless the owner either:
(A) Enters into an agreement with the political subdivision permitting the team to play most of its home games elsewhere;
(B) Gives the political subdivision in which the facility is located not less than six months' advance notice of the owner's intention to cease playing most of its home games at the facility and, during the six months after such notice, gives the political subdivision or any individual or group of individuals who reside in the area the opportunity to purchase the team.
[https://codes.ohio.gov/ohio-revised-code/section-9.67]
In other words, under paragraph A, the Browns can only move to Brook Park if Bibb lets them do so—which if does, he is not serving the city and is hurting his entire electoral base given the loss of tax revenues to the city which funds police and other city services. His inaction will also hurt existing businesses and dissuade any new prospective businesses from opening or moving to the city given a reputation of lawlessness and ineffective governance.
Under paragraph B, the Mayor can force a sale of the team to the city or private parties. Creative funding can be used and the mayor or a designee could put assemble a limited liability partnership or other entity to be new owners if a single buyer does not step forward. Forbes recently valued the Browns at $4.6B. While that may seem like a large number, it could be crowd-sourced among the roughly 2.8 million people in Cleveland (defined as Cuyahoga and the six outer counties) or the City itself, either solely or in partnership with others, could buy the team and the profits would readily pay debt service while providing more funds for police, EMS, and other city needs.
The Haslams are likely very aware of this law. In fact, according to a recent Signal Cleveland article, the Haslams personally benefitted from the it: “… the Haslams were able to purchase the Columbus Crew soccer team in part because the former club owners – who wanted to move the team out of Columbus – were required to follow the Art Modell law.”
Notice the wording of the law and the exact language used by the Haslams. The law states,
“No owner of a professional sports team that uses a tax-supported facility for most of its home games and receives financial assistance from the state or a political subdivision thereof shall cease playing most of its home games at the facility and begin playing most of its home games elsewhere unless the owner…..gives the political subdivision in which the facility is located not less than six months' advance notice of the owner's intention to cease playing most of its home games at the facility….”
Did the Haslams actually give such notice? Their public statement said:
“We have communicated to the Mayor and his team at every step of the process regarding our mutual efforts to keep the stadium downtown and we conveyed to them yesterday, our most impactful investment for our region is to focus on making a dome stadium and adjacent development in Brook Park a reality.”
It’s a critical point—when did the clock start ticking, if it has at all? Is the Haslams’ October 17th statement the “advance notice of the owner’s intention”? They used the word “focus” on “Brook Park”. However, the statement is being treated as the official statement to cease operations in the city of Cleveland and a court could rule that the city’s response to the statement is its acceptance of a fact.
Is the language intentionally vague so the city does not act on enforcing the law and loses the opportunity as there a six-month time window to respond? Or is the language intentionally vague as part of the yet-ongoing negotiation strategy of the Haslams to get more than the $461 million that Bibb has already offered them?
Regardless of how bad a move to Brook Park may be for the public and how lucrative it could be for the Haslams, Bibb must uphold and enforce the law, and act strategically and intelligently given the tight timeframe. If “official notice” has not yet been given, then he should use this as “extra time” before the six-month window to find a potentially new local owner or owners or undertake the preparatory financial work to buy the team as a city asset. City ownership would significantly benefit the city and its residents. If “official notice” has indeed been given on October 17, he must move quickly to fulfill his legal obligation as mayor.
We think a move to Brook Park is ludicrous and the suburb does not have the physical or operational infrastructure to host the team. A move to Brook Park negatively impacts the City of Cleveland, will cause a traffic nightmare for the people and businesses of Brook Park and anyone trying to get to Hopkins Airport from nearby roads on game days, will hurt parking revenue at Hopkins Airport (though may increase Red Line rapid transit ridership), and negatively impacts fans to be limited to a Browns-controlled experience vs enjoying a variety of restaurants and life in a real city versus at a bland suburban development where prices for everything (parking, shopping, restaurants, etc.) can be centrally controlled. And, of course, we get it. Such control is highly lucrative. Parking alone could bring in $1.2M per game, at $50 per game at 24,000 spaces.
However, only Dee and Jimmy Haslam and those who they have chosen, know what their real plans are and whether they really want to move to the burbs or are just pretending such as part of their negotiation strategy with the city of Cleveland. Their statement on October 17th may indeed just be part of this strategy or it may be their true intentions and perhaps the wording of their publicly-issued “statement” intentionally masked this to avoid the Bibb from noticing that he has six months left to buy the team or find a new owner.
As for locations in the city, we do not support destroying viable, public assets for private interests. Hence, the reported offer of Burke Airport by Mayor Bibb is ludicrous to us. We support a Downtown location, which offers not only a central location for the entire region, but the best transportation infrastructure (roads, rail transit, and bus transit) and the established concentration of restaurants, hotels, and other amenities. The current location is feasible. However, a new location would allow for construction to occur while the current field is in use and would open up the area between W. 3 and E. 9 north of the Shoreway to new, daily, year-round uses. Our favored location is the area around Commercial Road and E. 9 St. Extension (south of the Innerbelt) with a new, rapid station immediately adjacent to the stadium. This would be diagonally southwest of Progressive Field, across I-90. The location also benefits from riverfront property where new restaurants or apartments could be built as supporting and adjacent uses.
At that location, the Haslams can have everything they wanted—a dome, some (multi-level) parking, and “adjacent development” and also have riverfront access and a true “Cleveland vibe” versus being in a non-descript, bland suburb. And, most importantly, they can keep ownership of their team, and likely get the half billion dollars that Bibb has already offered them.
Otherwise, Bibb must enforce the law.
