Taxpayer Assists Sweetened Deal In Lightning Buy

By KAREN BRANCH-BRIOSO The Tampa Tribune

Published: Aug 9, 2007

TAMPA - Ask and ye shall receive.

For the most part, that approach worked quite well for Tampa Bay Lightning owners as they sought financial concessions of late from local and state governments.

In late 2004, the county agreed to their request for Hillsborough to assume ownership of the St. Pete Times Forum. The financial result: Six-figure property tax bills vanished.

In 2005, the team asked the county to drop its 50-cent ticket surcharge for Forum events. The county, which uses the money to pay debt on bonds it issued to help build the arena, restructured the bonds, so tourism tax money eventually will cover debt payments entirely. The result for the Lightning: Come 2010, no more service charge.

Then last year, the county agreed to spend as much $35 million from tourist tax money to reimburse the Lightning for upgrades to the Forum.

Now that Palace Sports & Entertainment has sold the team - and its control of the Forum - to Absolute Hockey Enterprises, a question arises:

Did the owners seek all of that help to make it attractive to a potential buyer?

"No," responded Bill Wickett, executive vice president of communications for the Lightning and the Forum, which, the owners say, have lost millions every year except for 2004, the year the team won the Stanley Cup.

"All our group has been trying to do is make life a little more livable for the franchise. We've asked the city, the county and the state for help in doing that."

However, Wickett said he suspects the recent financial improvements didn't hurt. "Absolutely, if they had to contemplate extra money annually for ad-valorem taxes or they had to contemplate putting our own money into the facility for keeping it modern, it's probably less attractive to them."

Parking Revenue Request Deflected

The team didn't get everything it asked for. For more than a year, Lightning officials have been meeting with city administrators, asking the city to boost the team's share of parking revenue. They also asked the city for better signs around the arena. So far, the city hasn't struck a deal.

And just this spring, the Lightning went to the Florida Legislature, asking for a $2-million-a-year sales tax rebate for the next 15 years to pay for Forum improvements. The Tampa Sports Authority is using a similar tax break at the Forum to pay off the bonds it issued to help the Lightning build the arena in the first place.

But in a tough budget year, with Floridians clamoring for relief from soaring property tax and homeowners insurance bills, it was a no-go from the start. "We just didn't have the dollars to do it. It never got heard," said Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, who sponsored the plan for the Lightning.

Fasano said he wouldn't try again anytime soon. "Not in this environment. We can't be doing those types of corporate exemptions when we're asking others to cut back."

Although the property tax exemptions for the Forum are a recent windfall, Wickett noted that the Lightning, under William Davidson, had long fought property tax bills. When Davidson was negotiating the deal to buy the Lightning and for the leasehold rights to the Forum, the arena was exempt from property taxes, Wickett said.

But in 1999, the year the sale went through, the county began sending property tax bills to businesses that leased public property held by groups such as the Tampa Sports Authority - the Forum's owner at the time.

After that, Davidson sued the county appraiser's office, challenging its assessments as too high. The courts lowered them. Then the county, whose properties are tax-exempt, reduced the property taxes to nothing by taking over ownership from the sports authority.

Refinancing A Win For Taxpayers

Those property taxes have vanished from local government coffers, but the county's director of debt management says taxpayers are getting a better deal by refinancing the bonds issued to help build the Forum. Originally issued as taxable bonds, the county refinanced them so they're tax-exempt, lowering the interest the county must pay. That's the deal that by 2010 will eliminate the 50-cent surcharge the county collects on Forum event tickets, except for Lightning season ticket sales.

It's another recent win for the Lightning's soon-to-be-ex-owners and for the new owners. But Mike Merrill says it was a win for taxpayers, too, saving them about $1.5 million.

"We made this conscious decision it would be better for the county net to make those bonds tax-exempt," said Merrill, the county's director of debt management. "We'll be better off because we'll be paying off a lot less in interest costs on the bonds. It's not really that big of a deal."

Reporter Ellen Gedalius contributed to this report. Reporter Karen Branch-Brioso can be reached at kbranch-brioso@tampatrib.com or (813)259-7815 .