Fans Should Own the Dodgers (Blog)

On April 26, 2011, Janice Hahn presented a resolution to the City Council, which it adopted, that the City lobby for changes in federal legislation that would allow the Dodgers to become publicly owned. (11-0002-S71). 

In 1922, the United States Supreme Court held that baseball is exempt from anti-trust legislation.  It doesn’t seem likely that Major League Baseball will voluntarily ease its rules on team ownership that allow the MLB to monopolize the sport.

The Green Bay Packers (incorporated in 1923) are the only non-profit community-owned major league sports team in the United States. Such ownership is in direct violation of current league rules, which stipulate a limit of 32 owners of one team and one of those owners having a minimum 30% stake.  

112,158 stockholders own the Packers, and they hold their meetings in their stadium.   http://www.packers.com/community/shareholders.html.

Wisconsin fans enjoy the team with the confidence that their owner won’t threaten to move to Los Angeles unless the team gets a new mega-dome. Volunteers work concessions, with sixty per cent of the proceeds going to local charities. “ Not only has home field been sold out for two decades, but during snowstorms, the team routinely puts out calls for volunteers to help shovel and is never disappointed by the response.” ("Those Non-Profit Packers," posted by Dave Zirin in The New Yorker, January 25, 2011. )
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/sportingscene/2011/01/those-non-profit-packers.html#ixzz1RS2nZngp.

Local governments subsidize stadiums in the belief stadiums generate local revenue – and they might but when they do, they play a zero-sum game.   People coming to the stadium are giving up other forms of entertainment, which also generate income – including local bars, restaurants and movies.   (“Leaky Stadiums” by David Marsco) http://economics.about.com/cs/sportseconomics/l/aa021403a.html.

In 2009, the California State Senate approved a bill  -- aggressively sought by billionaire Ed Roski, Jr. and his Majestic Realty Co. --  that granted a proposed stadium project in the City of Industry an exemption from the California Environmental Quality Act. http://www.planetizen.com/node/41261.
More recently, AEG is looking to privately finance a stadium and revamped convention center that will be exempt from CEQA.

Public employees often resent their city council’s siphoning off of public money at their expense to reward billionaire sports team owners.  (Id.)

If Los Angeles residents are going to suffer from degraded environment and economy, and if they are going to pay for stadiums with reduced public services in order for local governments to subsidize owner profits, then the fans should be the ones to own the sports teams.