Should tourists be forced to pay for soccer?

(by by Jay Evensen desnews.com 2-4-06)

So after months of dribbling around the pitch, this is how it could go down. Real Salt Lake's new stadium in Sandy — announced before anyone had an idea how it was going to be financed but just in time to help Sandy's mayor before the election — could be built in part with tourist taxes.

Specifically, we're talking what policy wonks call TRTs, bureaucracy-speak for "transient room taxes." This is one of a class of taxes created through the years to raise money without costing local people much of anything. Often lumped under the term "excise taxes" these levies hit specific commodities.

Other examples include the taxes applied to cigarette sales. These are popular because they apply to things people already feel guilty about. Transient room taxes are applied to the hotel bills of visitors, and those are folks who don't happen to have any representatives at the state Legislature.

The difference between the two is that it is not immoral for governments to promote tourism in order to boost revenues. Hang your project on cigarette taxes and, well, you face all sorts of ethical dilemmas if revenues fall.

So I'll tip my hat to Real Salt Lake. For once, the team's claims that it will use public funding that won't burden local taxpayers are beginning to ring true. The TRTs they want to use — amounting to $45 million of a $145 million stadium, hotel and business complex — wouldn't even impose any new taxes on visitors, at least not immediately. They would just extend a tax that was set to expire in 10 years. If we must use public money for pro soccer (and that is something no one has yet demonstrated), this is about the least offensive way to do it.

So, OK, kick away. But let's be clear about one thing: There is no such thing as free money, just as there is no such thing in soccer as an insignificant pass or shot. An incidental kick may not have a direct bearing on the game, but at the very least it takes up valuable time players could have used doing something else.

If that metaphor seems a bit heavy, maybe a simple question would work better. Is the construction of a professional soccer stadium the best use of taxes on hotel rooms?

Here, the answers get murky.

Governments typically use tourist taxes to do a couple of things: Defray tourist-related costs, such as the need for a greater police presence or other emergency services, and promote tourism itself.

Any increase in the cost of a hotel stay will have its impacts. In this case, it won't likely keep people away from Salt Lake County, because the plan is to extend, not add, a tax. But it may limit how much government could raise tourist taxes in the future, for more pressing needs.

Professional soccer isn't a huge tourist draw. Team officials acknowledge that but counter that the occasional World Cup qualifier, such as last year's game here between the U.S. team and Costa Rica, is. That game attracted 40,586 fans. A study conducted by the University of Utah's Bureau of Economic and Business Research determined that about 37.6 percent of them were from out of state. Based on what those people told researchers, they spent an average of $821.10 for other things — room and board primarily — during their stay. That calculates to about $12.7 million total, spread out among hotels and restaurants.

That made the game a rousing success. But of course the game was played at Rice-Eccles Stadium. No need to subtract the public cost of construction from the total. Also, team officials estimate the new stadium, when configured for standing-room-only and temporary extra seating, would accommodate only about 30,000 for World Cup games.

But I'll buy the idea that events like these help the economy and could, eventually, cover the cost of construction. That would take a lot of games.

Primarily, though, they will help Sandy's economy. That could be a big sticking point with county leaders.

The TRT proposal is only one of a few floating around the state Capitol these days, but it seems to be the most viable. Still, it doesn't answer what ought to be the overriding question in all this: Why should tourists be forced to pay for soccer?

Lots of businesses bring in jobs and visitors without public funding. The Sundance Film Festival isn't asking the state to build public theaters. The fact that Real Salt Lake can't make this deal work on its own ought to give pause.

But with the goal in sight and nobody raising an offsides flag, Real Salt Lake may be rearing back for its best shot.