[Originally published in the Front Range Voluntaryist, article by Paotie Dawson]
It used to strike fear in the hearts of children and adults everywhere and at anytime that news of the taxman cometh. But today, in a time when people openly feel taxation is a good thing and that the wealthy should pay far more of it, we find ourselves faced with strange proposals to build teenie, tiny stadiums in downtown Colorado Springs at the tune of at least $28 million in taxpayers money. In spite of the best efforts of the Colorado Springs Gazette editorial board, this is one part of the City for Champions boondoggle that struggles to be built by cronies and bureaucrats, and funded by everyone else, especially poor, marginalized and working-class folks.
The latest proposed City for Champions boondoggle centered around Antlers Park in the downtown area. The park, donated way back when to the City to encourage and inspire homeowners to cultivate gardens in their yards, was proposed as the site for a new, tiny, teenie little stadium mainly to house a professional soccer team. Oh! And to occasionally hold events in the now-fictional 10,000 seat stadium. If you don’t know, Antlers Park is a bit of a small park situated next to Pikes Peak Community College; there are old and majestically tall trees in the park, and grass, and also a few homeless folks and transients, and some not-so-good things, like needles in the grass, bureaucrats in the bushes, and so forth.
Through the years, the Gazette has pushed and promoted boondoggles, including the proposed tiny stadium at Antlers Park, to be created and funded through taxes and more taxes. Why does the Gazette, often mistaken as some sort of libertarian newspaper, want the City for Champions project so badly? What’s in it for them? Well, the long of it short: the Gazette will print things that serve only their political ends and, most especially, its owner. Want more cronyism Support City for Champions! Want things like eminent domain to be used against the poor and vulnerable populations? Support City for Champions! Want to tax more poor and marginalized folks to pay for wealthy developers’ fantasies of building stadiums in the downtown Colorado Springs? Support City for Champions!
It seems it is a given that the now-cancelled proposal to build a teenie, tiny stadium at Antlers Park was really a prelude to another proposal to build another stadium elsewhere in Colorado Springs. But unfortunately, early reports for the new proposed stadium are all a big giant secret. Colorado Springs City Councilor Richard “Big Secrets” Skorman earned himself a new nickname by refusing to tell the public about the secretive plans to build another stadium elsewhere in Colorado Springs. Did you get all of that? Good.
During a time of increasing homelessness controversies and folks struggling to afford and keep their families in their homes, the last thing we need to do is start creating more bureaucracy, more problems, more taxes, mo’ bureaucrats, mo’ problems, mo’ … wait! I’ve already covered this. But in all seriousness, City for Champions should be rebranded as its rightful name as City for Boondoggles, and voters and residents should be calling for an end to the continued relationship between politicians and wealthy developers in Colorado Springs.
The proposal at Antlers Park was a bait and switch tactic; questions abound about the new and secretive stadium to be proposed at another site in Colorado Springs; but whatever, and whichever, taxpayers should not have to pay one shiny penny for yet another boondoggle. Residents need a break from the boondoggle expansion, in which politicians, bureaucrats, and wealthy developers continuously and secretly (SHH!) scheme to make themselves richer at the expense of everyone else.
Sadly, Colorado Springs has become the long, happy life of a cronyist paradise. Liberty and economic freedom are quickly becoming things of the past, in large part, thanks to the Gazette and its editorial board, which forever seems to pitch for yet more and more cronyist-fueled boondoggles.
Just say no, Colorado Springs, to the boondoggle men!