Dolphins Want Super Bowl Roof as Miami-Dade Cuts Jobs (Update1)

Feb. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Taxpayers in Miami and Fort Lauderdale have little interest and less money to pay for stadium upgrades that football executives say are needed for the area to extend its record of hosting 10 Super Bowls.

Miami-Dade County, Florida’s most-populous, already faces $2.9 billion of projects, including more than half the $645 million cost of building a stadium for Major League Baseball’s Florida Marlins. Neighboring Broward County, which will house one of this year’s competing Super Bowl teams, cut $385 million in spending over three years to balance its budget. The City of Miami itself is paring expenses to pay employee-retirement costs that eat up 18 percent of its budget this year.

Local leaders say the region can’t afford to put a roof over Sun Life Stadium, site of the National Football League championship game on Feb. 7. Miami-Dade County expects $237 million less revenue this fiscal year and has pared 1,000 jobs amid the worst national recession since the 1930s. Standard & Poor’s lowered its outlook on the county last month.

“We’re at one of the worst moments in our history,” said Jose Diaz, 49, a county commissioner and chairman of the Miami- Dade County Sports Commission. “It would be very difficult right now, and we’re just coming out of the Marlins stadium deal.”

‘Umbrella’ Proposal

The 23-year-old Super Bowl stadium, built for $115 million, is owned by New York real estate developer Stephen M. Ross and his Miami Dolphins NFL franchise. Team executives said Jan. 7 that it trails covered stadiums in Dallas, New Orleans and Indianapolis in the race to host future championships. It may not get another, they say, without protection from downpours like the one during Miami’s 2007 game.

“South Florida is one of the few communities competing for Super Bowls that still have an open-air facility,” Dolphins’ Chief Executive Officer Mike Dee, 46, said when the team unveiled drawings of a 621,000-square-foot “umbrella” ringing Sun Life Stadium, which seats 75,540 for football. It would rise 25 feet (7.6 meters) above the highest seats, supported by columns at each corner. An open center would leave the athletic turf uncovered.

“This is a great venue in its current form,” Dee said in an interview. “We’re looking 5, 10, 15, 20 years down the road to make sure that South Florida is able to attract 10 of the next 44 Super Bowls, as we have 10 of the first 44.”

‘State-of-the-Art’

The Miami venue needs to be “state-of-the-art” to compete for Super Bowls, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said at a December luncheon at the stadium, the Associated Press reported.

Neither Dee nor the Super Bowl Host Committee, which organizes Miami’s bids, would say how much the roof and other improvements, including new lighting for high-definition television broadcasts, would cost or how they would be financed.

Host Committee Chairman Rodney Barreto, 52, and Dee cited studies by Sports Management Research Institute, a West Palm Beach, Florida, company hired by the host committee, showing the 2007 game brought the area $400 million in direct spending.

The Super Bowl is worth $30 million to $90 million, said Victor Matheson, a sports economist at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts.

“You could host a Super Bowl every year for the next 20 and be lucky to recoup your costs,” said Matheson, co-author of a 2004 paper on the event’s economic impact.

Security Expenses

Miami-Dade County will spend $3.1 million during this year’s event for airport security, fire and medical-emergency units, police and other preparations, said Victoria Mallette, Mayor Carlos Alvarez’s spokeswoman. It also contributed $1.5 million to the Super Bowl Host Committee, she said.

County voters already face larger bills under a bond program they backed in 2004. The district’s $369 million share of the Marlins Stadium project would be more than twice the $155 million coming from the team, according to a March presentation on the county Web site.

Spending on the Marlins will yield more than public funds for Sun Life stadium, which Alvarez, 57, opposes, said Mallette.

“The Marlins have 81 home games and that franchise will be here for the next 35 years,” Mallette said. “Improvements to the stadium are all about the possibility of being eligible for a Super Bowl every four, five or six years.”

Tapping Reserves

Miami-Dade used reserves to help close a $444 million deficit in this year’s budget, depleting them by 38 percent and prompting S&P to cut its outlook on the county’s general- obligation bonds to “negative” from “stable” in January.

New York-based S&P kept an AA- rating, its fourth-highest, on the county, while saying tapping more reserves could bring a downgrade.

The difference in yield between a 5 3/8 percent general- obligation bond due in 2038 and Municipal Market Advisors’ index of top-rated 30-year bonds was 51 basis points today, narrowing from 62 in March when the debt was sold. It rose as high as 120 basis points on Jan. 15. A basis point is 0.01 percentage point.

Broward County, which is at Miami-Dade’s northern border and cut spending for a third year to help close a $106 million budget deficit, can’t pay for stadium upgrades, said Ken Keechl, 47, its mayor.

The county got $186 million of economic benefit from the 2007 Super Bowl, said the visitors bureau for Fort Lauderdale, 15 miles (24 kilometers) from Sun Life Stadium. The city’s hotels this year will house NFL staff; the American Football Conference champion Indianapolis Colts; league awards ceremonies and official parties for the game.

County’s Decision

Given the stadium’s suburban location of Miami Gardens, it’s up to Miami-Dade to decide on spending public money for improvements, said David Karsh, a spokesman for City of Miami Commissioner David Sarnoff.

The city, facing $90.5 million of catch-up payments to union pension funds this year, is paying for its $120 million portion of Marlins Stadium under a budget that cuts costs 3 percent. It spent $10 million to demolish the Orange Bowl, where the baseball park is being built, and must finance its parking garages. A $92 million parking-bond sale has been delayed since December amid a Securities and Exchange Commission probe into city finances.

“A great majority of our community was outraged at the Marlins Stadium deal,” Karsh said. “You would have to anticipate similar sentiment if yet more public funds are steered toward benefiting wealthy team owners.”

The Miami area will become the first to host 10 Super Bowls when the 44th meeting of the champions of the NFL’s AFC, and the National Football Conference champions, this year the New Orleans Saints, begins at about 6:30 p.m. local time. New Orleans will also have 10 with the game at its Superdome in 2013. Dallas has it next year and Indianapolis in 2012.

Naming Rights

Toronto, Canada-based Sun Life Financial Inc. bought naming rights to Miami’s stadium in January. The deal wasn’t contingent on renovations, according to Dee.

“The Super Bowl has made this site its home many times over the years and we believe Sun Life Stadium will get its fair share of Super Bowls in the future,” said Alexi Maravel, a spokesman for Sun Life Financial (U.S.) in Boston, in an e-mail.

The venue hosted the Pro Bowl, the NFL all-star game, on Jan. 31 and will remain the Marlins’ home until their covered field opens in 2012.

Joe Robbie, the Dolphins’ original owner, used so-called industrial development bonds and bank loans to build the stadium. The previous owner of the stadium and the team, H. Wayne Huizenga, turned to the same type of debt to upgrade it in 2007.

These bonds are repaid by private developers and aren’t general obligations of municipalities where they are issued.

“Robbie proved that an entire stadium can be built with private money if local governments stand strong to protect taxpayers,” Karsh said.

To contact the reporters on this story: Jerry Hart in Miami at jhart@bloomberg.net; Aaron Kuriloff in New York at akuriloff@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Mark Tannenbaum at mtannen@bloomberg.net; Michael Sillup at msillup@bloomberg.net.