MADISON, Wis. -- Taxpayers would foot half the cost of a new $500 million arena for the Milwaukee Bucks under a financial deal that would rely on current and former team owners for the rest, Gov. Scott Walker said Thursday.
Walker, a likely presidential candidate, has argued for months that it will cost the state more in lost income-tax revenue if the NBA moves the team from Milwaukee than it will to pay for a new downtown arena.
Standing behind a podium with a sign that read, "Cheaper to Keep Them," he announced the long-awaited deal surrounded by Republican legislative leaders, along with the Democratic leaders of the city and Milwaukee County. "The price of no has a cost," Walker said.
Walker, team officials, state lawmakers, Milwaukee's Democratic mayor and the Milwaukee County executive have been negotiating behind closed doors for weeks.
The plan Walker spelled out includes $250 million already committed by the Bucks' current and former owners. The other half will come from taxpayers, a contribution capped at $250 million, with the team bearing any responsibility for cost overruns. It wasn't immediately clear whether taxpayers might wind up paying more due to borrowing and interest costs.
"This is a much better deal than most other projects like it around the country," state Sen. Alberta Darling, the co-chairwoman of the Legislature's budget-writing committee, said before the news conference.
Without a new stadium by 2017, the NBA has said it will buy back the team and move it. The Bucks currently play in the 27-year-old BMO Harris Bradley Center.
Republicans who control the Legislature criticized parts of the plan reported during negotiations, raising questions about whether there are enough votes to approve it. And conservatives -- including Americans for Prosperity, a conservative group founded by billionaires Charles and David Koch -- have said the deal is a bad for taxpayers.
A majority of Republican state senators don't want the arena financing plan to come under the two-year $70 billion state budget, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported Wednesday. An alternative route could be introducing the plan as a separate bill, where Democrats would join with Republicans to get enough votes in support.
Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said Wednesday that the process of passing the plan didn't matter as much as doing what's best for the state. Myranda Tanck, spokeswoman for Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, said Thursday the Bucks deal is planned to be in the budget, though introducing it as a separate bill has not been ruled out.
Current Bucks owners Marc Lasry and Wesley Edens bought the team in April 2014 from former U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl for $550 million. At the time, Lasry and Edens pledged to contribute $100 million toward arena funding, but have since increased that to $150 million. Kohl also has pledged $100 million.
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AP Sports Writer Genaro C. Armas in Milwaukee contributed to this report.
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