by Stop Mike Lupica on November 2 at 10:35AM
Not quite a fine, but... Mayor Bloomberg final got a chance to enact some revenge on James Dolan yesterday. He was asked by a reporter about the whether Madison Square Garden would still get a $10.9 million tax break from the city next year. His response:
I always like it when my state Senator chooses to pass a bill by making a comparison to an armed robbery.
The problem is that the tax break deal won't expire until the Garden actually moves. It is expected to move in 2011, heading west a couple of streets to take over the space behind the new Penn Station (which will be where the Post Office is now). Mayor Bloomberg's term expires in 2009.
Of course, if he has a say in it, Bloomberg would give Dolan a big FU. Dolan, if you don't remember, lead the crusade against the west side Jets Stadium proposal that was the centerpiece of Bloomberg's 2012 Olympic bid proposal. Ironically, among the arguments that Dolan and MSG made against the Olympic/Jets Stadium on the west side, one of them was complaining about city money being used to fund the stadium! I should note now that most of the stadium funding was suppose to come privately from Jets owner Woody Johnson's pockets, but that he would get some very generous tax breaks and cheap land, among other things (a city paid subway station, though that's still in the works). James Dolan and MSG arguing about city money being wasted on stadiums while pocketing a generous tax break is morally questionable.
And if it were up to him, Mayor Bloomberg would enact a bit of revenge in the form of making Cablevision pay it's city taxes....
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"Not if I'm mayor they won't,"
Bloomberg snapped. "
But even senators critical of the proposal said they preferred
the tax breaks to losing the sports teams. ''When someone has a gun to your
head and says, 'Your money or your life,' sometimes you have to give your
money,'' said Senator Franz Leichter, a Manhattan Democrat. ''There is no one
more rapacious than the owners of sports teams. The fact is, if we don't give
in to this blackmail, I'm convinced we will lose the Knicks and the Rangers.''
I always like it when my state Senator chooses to pass a bill by making a comparison to an armed robbery.
The problem is that the tax break deal won't expire until the Garden actually moves. It is expected to move in 2011, heading west a couple of streets to take over the space behind the new Penn Station (which will be where the Post Office is now). Mayor Bloomberg's term expires in 2009.
Of course, if he has a say in it, Bloomberg would give Dolan a big FU. Dolan, if you don't remember, lead the crusade against the west side Jets Stadium proposal that was the centerpiece of Bloomberg's 2012 Olympic bid proposal. Ironically, among the arguments that Dolan and MSG made against the Olympic/Jets Stadium on the west side, one of them was complaining about city money being used to fund the stadium! I should note now that most of the stadium funding was suppose to come privately from Jets owner Woody Johnson's pockets, but that he would get some very generous tax breaks and cheap land, among other things (a city paid subway station, though that's still in the works). James Dolan and MSG arguing about city money being wasted on stadiums while pocketing a generous tax break is morally questionable.
And if it were up to him, Mayor Bloomberg would enact a bit of revenge in the form of making Cablevision pay it's city taxes....
Leave a comment
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