In what has been an ongoing issue in both Northern and Southern California, it appears that the debate regarding the use of public funds to build a stadium is spilling over to Las Vegas.
As most of you already know, Sin City and the Oakland Raiders have been joined at the hip in recent months. The two sides continue to work towards the possibility of Raiders owner Mark Davis moving his squad to the desert metropolis.
NFL owners, the Raiders themselves and leaders within Vegas have all come out to support the idea of the team moving from Oakland.
One minor hiccup here.
In order for a stadium to be erected in Vegas, taxpayers would have to foot some of the bill — a reality that local citizens don’t seem too comfortable with right now.
A local ABC affiliate in Clark County ran a poll in unison with Rasmussen Reports that shows 55 percent of local residents would oppose the use of $500 million in taxpayer cash to help fund a new Raiders stadium.
What makes this so interesting is that this $500 million figure would represent the absolute floor that would be needed from the public to build a stadium. Most estimates have that number at $750-plus million right now (more on that here).
Equally as interesting, only 35 percent of those polled said that they would support the use of a half of billion dollars to help fund the project.
It must be noted that any tax increase wouldn’t be voted on by the citizens of the region. Instead, that’s left up to the discretion of the state legislature, which is slated to meet in February of 2017.
Using taxpayer funds to help finance NFL stadiums has long been in an issue, primarily in the state of California where both the Raiders and San Diego Chargers remain in flux.
Though, any increase in taxes within Clark County would impact tourists more than citizens, as said increase would be utilized through the guise of tax hikes at casinos, resorts and hotels.
Whether the state legislature takes into account what seems to be strong opposition to public financing remains to be seen.