HB2704 would divert about $20 million in sales tax and income tax every year for 30 years away from public uses to give it to the billionaire baseball owners for stadium repairs.  Every dollar to the billionaires would take a dollar away from roads, public safety, parks, education, and workforce needs like childcare. 

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Arizonans are fiercely independent and will not be played.   

The Diamondbacks owners are pushing for YOU, John Q. Taxpayer, to pay for stadium upgrades, repairs, and maintenance and they are employing strong tactics to get what they want. Arizona legislators should stand against attempts to push through legislation that does not protect voters’ interest in taxpayer dollars and provide transparency to our residents.

Behind closed doors,  highly-paid lobbyists are twisting arms and negotiating for a deal to help the billionaire owners of  Arizona Baseball, Inc. (The Diamondbacks) 

Key parts would take taxes away from the state,  city , and county and divert them to a special fund for repairs on the stadium:

• All the sales tax collected in the ballpark
• Income taxes from the millionaire ballplayers and everybody else employed in the ballpark
• Maximum $20 mil per year,  indexed to INCREASE every year by 3% -- likely to grow to be over $1 billion
• for 30 years
• State legislators and Mayor Gallego have asked for engineering reports that list the repairs that need to be done, but the team representatives have not presented one. 
• State legislators have asked for accountability measures such as a dollar-for-dollar match of D-backs funding with public funding,  but the team's reps will not put that in writing. 
• Maricopa County is likely to pay its share by taking money away from funds for roads. 
• The state sales and income taxes would be diverted AWAY from statewide projects like education, safety, and roads,  to put all of it into the stadium in Maricopa County.  

These terms are unacceptable on many levels.   Let's start with the notion that the dollars should be increased every year by 3%.   Compare that to our K12 funding plan that allows per-pupil funding to increase by 2% or the rate of inflation, whichever is LOWER!   A 3% automatic increase is purely a giveaway to billionaires!

Our state budget cannot handle new spending.  Arizona should be investing in water resources and infrastructure, learning materials for a 21st Century education,  public safety to fight the fentanyl epidemic, and affordable housing.  We should not be giving away our few public funds to billionaires. 

Team representatives have made noises about leaving Arizona if HB2704 is not passed, but we've seen this play before and it's not a pretty look -- billionaire team owners insistent on public money to subsidize private sports teams.  That caused a little PR trouble for the team. Next, we saw the bill sponsor, Representative Jeff Weninger,  making a contrary claim on local TV news shows saying, "The Diamondbacks are not going anywhere."    

So what’s the truth? The Diamondbacks have already hit a homerun calling Arizona home with a fanbase that loves the team, and we all know that fans make the game.  

Phoenix has about twice the population of other cities that may be looking for teams, and we empirically know that a market's size affects a team's financial resources. Arizona allows professional teams to operate sports betting. That's worth tens of millions of dollars to the Diamondbacks, money that would be hard to replace because markets like Salt Lake City ban sports betting.

In addition to sports betting income, the team already keeps  the revenue from everything sold at the stadium including concerts, baseball, hot dogs, T-shirts, and all.  The corporate owners received $328 million in 2024 (see Forbes.com) just for the baseball events.  They have not shown an engineering report or why they need taxpayers to pay $20 mil per year.

Taxpayers already subsidize the team generously.  The team pays no rent, and no property taxes (millions in dollar value to the team) and taxpayers contributed to the hundreds of millions to build the stadium.  The team has an agreement with the County Stadium District requiring the team to pay $2 million per year to a fund for repairs, and to be responsible for repairs, but the documentation on that has been skimpy. 

 Threats of departure will only hurt the team and the fanbase in the long run. Arizonans need to be able to see and understand what they will get in return if they pay taxes for the County Stadium.  Over a hundred studies show that the public loses or the benefits are negligible when tax dollars are used for stadiums. Arizonans do not want to be on the losing end of this tax scheme, and they do not want to be left out of the decision.

 In Arizona, some sports deals have won at the ballot box,  and some have lost. This one should go to the voters.  Let the voters decide if they want to pay $20 million per year for 30 years to help billionaire baseball owners.  I think it's a better investment in Arizona to pay for roads, the needs of our vulnerable populations, addressing extreme heat, and of course, workforce fundamentals like childcare and education.  Those will lose if the billionaires win in this game.

Do you like that idea or not?  CLICK HERE to take our survey about the stadium.