[Politics] Blueprint vote is not about football, it’s about politics | Opinion

[FazzNoth]

Protesters wave signs outside City Hall on Thursday, Dec. 9, 2021, before a Blueprint 2020 vote on whether to spend nearly $26.5 million dollars in sales-tax funds for repairs at Doak Campbell Stadium.

 

The Blueprint Intergovernmental Agency meets again on February 24th and clearly the key item on the table will be further policy discussion of the $20 million vote for improvements to Doak Campbell Stadium taken in December 2021.

There has been considerable news coverage of the controversial December vote, as well as other public discussions on this issue going back to May 2021. My goal is not rehash what has been already been widely covered.

My goal is to encourage reasonable people to take a deep breath and consider the long term positive impact of the requested funding.

The importance of ensuring $20 million in bonding to make structural improvements to Doak Campbell Stadium is about facilitating a major project with one of our largest and most collaborative local economic drivers, which happens to be Florida State University.

Florida State University brings in nearly a billion dollars a year in impact to the local community annually, only a portion of that is related to athletics. The requested funds have a specific focus to address structural capital improvements.

It’s easy for some of the opponents of the funding to throw out red meat sound bites during an election year, such as “why are we using taxpayer dollars to benefit FSU boosters?”, “FSU does not need the money, look at their endowment!”, “FSU football is a losing team, so why should we bail them out?”.

For such a highly educated local po[CENSORED]tion, you would think the opponents could come up with better and cogent arguments.

The narrative that continues to get lost in the shuffle on this funding request is that in many respects this vote is not about football, it’s about politics

During what is sure to be a highly contested and politicized local election cycle, politicians have a choice, do they make policy decisions on what they believe to be politically expedient (things that generate a high amount of press coverage)? , or do they make decisions guided by facts that indicate a vote of support for the funding which serves as a positive economic impact that will benefit the citizens that elected them.

February 24th’s Blueprint Intergovernmental Agency meeting will certainly be one to watch for political theater, I just hope it has a good ending.

 

Bennett Napier, CAE, is President/CEO of Partners in Association Management.

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This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Upcoming Blueprint vote is not about football, it’s about politics | Opinion

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