[Excerpts]
Less than 24 hours after the Spurs launched their campaign to persuade Bexar County voters to approve using tax dollars for a downtown arena, COPS/Metro Alliance held their own kickoff (through the Defending Public Money for Public Good PAC) to kill the ballot measure.
“We have 400 people in the house today,” leader Rena Oden told those gathered inside St. Margaret Mary Catholic Church’s activity room. “That’s real good — but we got word that we have more in the house than the Spurs had yesterday.”
The crowd went wild.
“How about that? Let’s go!” said Oden, who is a member of Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church.
The interfaith grassroots advocacy group has been the loudest and most organized opposition to the proposed public-private partnership to build a $1.3 billion arena at the former Institute of Texan Cultures site at Hemisfair. The arena would be the centerpiece of a multibillion-dollar downtown sports and entertainment district envisioned by city officials, which is best known as Project Marvel....
“We are talking to voters and people about what truly concerns them because the bottom line is that the vast majority of these people will never be able to afford going to this new arena,” (Fr. Jimmy) Drennan told the San Antonio Express-News. “Where we do have our needs are in our neighborhoods.”
[Photo Credit: Robin Jerstad, San Antonio Express-News]
COPS/Metro Ramps up Effort to Get Voters to Nix Spurs Arena Deal, MSN [pdf]
COPS/Metro Ramps up Effort to Get Voters to Nix Spurs Arena Deal, San Antonio Express-News [pdf]
San Antonio: Do Stadium Subsidies Reward Billionaires or Communities?, Forbes [pdf]
Community Alliance Rallies Together Against Project Marvel Ballot Measures, KSAT [pdf]
The Spurs want this to happen, and Saturday they rallied support to vote yes in November, KENS5 [video]
Debate Heats up as Bexar County Prepares to Vote on Prob B for Project Marvel, News 4 WOAI [video]
What are Prop A and Prob B? Unpacking Bexar County's Nov. 4 Venue Tax Election, San Antonio Report [pdf]