Stealth Comic wrote:
To be treat somewhere equally with Br*dford would help.
This is the second time in the last 10 years they've pumped money in to that dump.
Our council tax is funding the aspirations of a club that we absolutely detest to the tune of £19m.
To be honest we're not expecting a nice shiny new ground like Leigh have but a million or two towards a new main stand would be nice.
The highlighted bit - that's not really true, you know (not the dump bit, obviously...the pumping money in bit...).
No money was "pumped in". All that happened was that the Council paid the club the net present value of what they were already contractually committed to pay (in terms of ground running costs and other annual contributions) up to 2019. No new money. In fact, with hindsight considering the current very low interest rates, the discount factor used was likely too high anyway - tough on the Bulls...life's a bitch, eh?
In return, the council got out of the escalating annual costs of operating and maintaining the ground, passing all the risks there from the Council Tax payers to the Bulls (who clearly underestimated the consequences).
Whether or not the original 1986 Agreement was fair or otherwise, to say more money was "pumped in" is either erroneous or disingenuous.
Remember too, the reversionary clause - most of the settlement has to be repaid to the council, on a sliding scale over time, if the Bulls move out of Odsal.
Incidentally, you are also TOTALLY wrong about the £19m (I may have said that to you elsewhere, too, if you post on TotalRL?) That money is predominantly from the sale of the airport, and is for the whole OSV project. Indeed, as I understand it none of that money goes into building a stadium.
If there was, say, a proposal to build a new Cougars stadium and leisure centre (to replace the Victoria LC) and other combined sporting facilities in a mini-village site say near the end of the new road off Marland Road or similar, part-funded by the council, as a council tax payer (and Aire Valley resident) I'd strongly support that.