burnet44
02-25-2007, 11:15 AM
Ever since the Cotton bowl wasn't named a BCS bowl and the destruction of the SWC coupled with decline of the Fair Park neighborhood the Cotton Bowl has been slowly dying.
The Cowboys left SMU left only 3 games a year
Jerry Park in Arlington is some of the last dirt shovled in the grave.
DMN news story
Cotton Bowl on shaky ground
Mistrust doomed Dallas' talks with Cowboys; but what happens to Cotton now?
By BRUCE TOMASO / The Dallas Morning News
btomaso@dallasnews.com
The Cotton Bowl has been home to big-time football contests for decades, including LSU vs. Texas in 1963. "It's the stadium that Doak Walker built," says the 58-year-old executive director of Friends of Fair Park. "It's the stadium where Billy Graham preached, and where Elvis Presley performed.
"The Cotton Bowl is rich in history. Dallas doesn't have a lot of history."
And the Cotton Bowl? Once the grandest stadium in the South, its future is cloudy.
"It's a dinosaur," said Mitchell Rasansky, a Dallas City Council member. "It's outgrown its day."
Yet the city is committed to spending $50 million, including $30 million in bond money, to renovate the stadium, notorious for its cramped seating, narrow concourses and lack of amenities.
"It's money down the drain," Mr. Rasansky said.
Even so, the Cotton Bowl hosts only three football games a year – and one of those, the January AT&T Cotton Bowl Classic, may bolt when the Dallas Cowboys' new stadium opens in Arlington in 2009.
Supporters say the Cotton Bowl's future – and, by extension, that of Fair Park and its surrounding neighborhoods – could have been vastly brighter had the city and county been able to swing a deal three years ago to bring the Cowboys back to their original home.
"This was our last chance ever to get the Cowboys back to Dallas," said Norm Hitzges, who hosts a daily sports talk show on "The Ticket" KTCK-AM (1310).
"Once they sink their roots out in Arlington, they'll be there for decades. And meanwhile, Fair Park will continue to rot – and we'll continue to pump money into it while it rots."
"And meanwhile, you could shoot off a Scud missile in downtown Dallas on a Wednesday night and not hit anybody."
Sources familiar with the talks between the Cowboys and Dallas County officials said those talks, marred from the start by mistrust on both sides, never really got off the ground.
In April 2004, the team picked Fair Park as its preferred site for a new stadium. An earlier option, a parcel along the Trinity River south of downtown, was ruled out because of the high costs of environmental remediation there.
And in June 2004, the team abruptly broke off talks, citing a lack of progress. Arlington jumped in, and on Nov. 2, 2004, voters there handily approved a $325 million stadium financing package.
Spreading blame
People familiar with the failed talks cite various reasons for the breakdown: missteps by an inexperienced county judge, a reluctance by the Republican-dominated Commissioners Court to raise taxes, a brash mayor who made no secret of her disdain for handouts to wealthy sports owners, and arrogance on the part of the Cowboys, who, in the view of some, blew into town with a take-it-or-leave-it attitude.
"Their interpretation of negotiating was to get us to say yes," said Jim Jackson, a former Dallas County commissioner who participated in the talks.
"It was sort of like, 'Just do what we tell you to do, or else,' " said Mr. Jackson, now a Republican member of the Texas House. "I didn't find that acceptable."
Margaret Keliher, the county judge at the time, said neither Jerry Jones, the Cowboys' owner, nor his son Stephen, the team's executive vice president, ever met with her, preferring to do business through consultants and lawyers.
"I found that kind of offensive," said Ms. Keliher.
Mr. Jackson, among others, questions whether the Cowboys ever intended to move to Fair Park. "I do kind of wonder if ... they weren't just playing a game with Dallas," he said.
Nonsense, said Brett Daniels, a spokesman for the Cowboys.
"We were very sincere in our efforts in trying to bring a new stadium to Dallas," he said. "Despite efforts on both sides to reach some kind of agreement, eventually there came a time to move forward elsewhere."
He said team executives didn't care to rehash the failed negotiations. "We're looking forward to our future in Arlington, not looking back." He added, "We believe that this facility will benefit not just Arlington, but the entire region."
Mr. Kirk, who left office in 2001 to run for the U.S. Senate, said the Cowboys were talking about a move to Dallas as early as the late 1990s. That's when Mr. Kirk, as mayor, was working on getting American Airlines Center built as the home of the Dallas Mavericks and Dallas Stars.
"I never had a conversation with Jerry Jones during all that time when he didn't say: 'Mr. Mayor, don't spend all of your money on the Stars and Mavericks. Save some for us,' " Mr. Kirk recalled.
In the stadium negotiations, the Cowboys chiefly dealt with the county, not the city. One reason was that there were, at least for a time, sites on the table that were in Dallas County but not within the Dallas city limits. Another is that the team was pushing a countywide increase in hotel and car rental taxes as the best way to raise $425 million toward a new stadium's cost.
But still another reason, one person close to the negotiations said, was that team representatives wanted to avoid a donnybrook with Mayor Laura Miller.
Miller a liability?
As a columnist for the Dallas Observer in the mid-1990s and later, as a City Council member, Ms. Miller railed against what she called the lopsided deal the city made to pay for American Airlines Center. She saw the use of tax money for the arena as a public subsidy for money-grubbing multimillionaire developers.
When it came time for the Cowboys to begin talks about a home in Dallas, said a Cowboys supporter familiar with the negotiations, "Our attitude was: Laura Miller, please stay out of this. We don't want you, we don't need you, don't interfere.
There was another concern, as well. The Cowboys insisted that a stadium financing referendum go before voters in the November 2004 general election. The conventional wisdom is that it's easier for naysayers to defeat such measures in special elections, when the turnout is much smaller.
But the conventional wisdom is also that referendums for new sports stadiums typically bring out a "Bubba" voter – young, male, blue-collar, and more likely than not Democratic. To some Republican officials, that was a potential problem.
In 2004, a presidential election year, GOP candidates found themselves in some hotly contested races. Danny Chandler was facing Democrat Lupe Valdez in the election for Dallas County sheriff. Republican Pete Sessions was squaring off against Democrat Martin Frost in a congressional race.
"The election of a president and congressmen and sheriffs is more important in the long run than a football stadium," Mr. Jackson said in the spring of 2004. He and other Republicans on the Commissioners Court opposed putting the Cowboys' question on the November ballot.
In a recent interview, Mr. Jackson acknowledged that he was worried about influencing the November turnout in favor of Democrats. But more important, he said, he didn't think the Cowboys had provided enough financial details to make a sound decision in time for the fall ballot.
"My position was if it was a good deal, Republicans would vote for it." In any case, she said, she didn't like being pressured by the Cowboys for a November vote.
"If it was a good deal in November, why wasn't it a good deal later on?"
But the Cowboys didn't wait.
Heading west
In the spring of 2004, team representatives imposed a June 30 deadline for a commitment from Dallas County – a deadline the county commissioners called unreasonable.
As the deadline neared, the team, sensing an impasse, ended the talks.
They took their ball to Arlington.
Ms. Miller, according to news reports at the time, gave it one last try. In July, she met with Jerry Jones and Stephen Jones.
"We couldn't agree," she said afterward.
"They made it very clear that they were going to find a town that would pay for a significant amount of the stadium. I made it clear that we weren't willing to pay for half their stadium."
The mayor added, "I have no regrets that they went to Arlington. It's too rich for me."
Even without the Cowboys, most people say, the Cotton Bowl is worth saving. All by itself, they say, the annual football game between the University of Texas and the University of Oklahoma, played during the State Fair, sprinkles enough cash on the city to justify continued improvements to the stadium. There's also the annual game between Grambling State University and Prairie View A&M.
"The Cotton Bowl has a relevant future in Dallas," said Mr. Kirk, the former mayor. "It can continue to be an important part of the State Fair and of the future of the Fair Park neighborhood for many years to come."
But wouldn't it have been better to have all that the stadium now offers, plus the Dallas Cowboys?
"That's like saying, 'Wouldn't I be in better shape if I'd quit eating donuts 10 years ago,' " he said.
"In retrospect, obviously it would have been better. But there's nothing we can do about that now. We can't put the genie back in the bottle."
The Cowboys left SMU left only 3 games a year
Jerry Park in Arlington is some of the last dirt shovled in the grave.
DMN news story
Cotton Bowl on shaky ground
Mistrust doomed Dallas' talks with Cowboys; but what happens to Cotton now?
By BRUCE TOMASO / The Dallas Morning News
btomaso@dallasnews.com
The Cotton Bowl has been home to big-time football contests for decades, including LSU vs. Texas in 1963. "It's the stadium that Doak Walker built," says the 58-year-old executive director of Friends of Fair Park. "It's the stadium where Billy Graham preached, and where Elvis Presley performed.
"The Cotton Bowl is rich in history. Dallas doesn't have a lot of history."
And the Cotton Bowl? Once the grandest stadium in the South, its future is cloudy.
"It's a dinosaur," said Mitchell Rasansky, a Dallas City Council member. "It's outgrown its day."
Yet the city is committed to spending $50 million, including $30 million in bond money, to renovate the stadium, notorious for its cramped seating, narrow concourses and lack of amenities.
"It's money down the drain," Mr. Rasansky said.
Even so, the Cotton Bowl hosts only three football games a year – and one of those, the January AT&T Cotton Bowl Classic, may bolt when the Dallas Cowboys' new stadium opens in Arlington in 2009.
Supporters say the Cotton Bowl's future – and, by extension, that of Fair Park and its surrounding neighborhoods – could have been vastly brighter had the city and county been able to swing a deal three years ago to bring the Cowboys back to their original home.
"This was our last chance ever to get the Cowboys back to Dallas," said Norm Hitzges, who hosts a daily sports talk show on "The Ticket" KTCK-AM (1310).
"Once they sink their roots out in Arlington, they'll be there for decades. And meanwhile, Fair Park will continue to rot – and we'll continue to pump money into it while it rots."
"And meanwhile, you could shoot off a Scud missile in downtown Dallas on a Wednesday night and not hit anybody."
Sources familiar with the talks between the Cowboys and Dallas County officials said those talks, marred from the start by mistrust on both sides, never really got off the ground.
In April 2004, the team picked Fair Park as its preferred site for a new stadium. An earlier option, a parcel along the Trinity River south of downtown, was ruled out because of the high costs of environmental remediation there.
And in June 2004, the team abruptly broke off talks, citing a lack of progress. Arlington jumped in, and on Nov. 2, 2004, voters there handily approved a $325 million stadium financing package.
Spreading blame
People familiar with the failed talks cite various reasons for the breakdown: missteps by an inexperienced county judge, a reluctance by the Republican-dominated Commissioners Court to raise taxes, a brash mayor who made no secret of her disdain for handouts to wealthy sports owners, and arrogance on the part of the Cowboys, who, in the view of some, blew into town with a take-it-or-leave-it attitude.
"Their interpretation of negotiating was to get us to say yes," said Jim Jackson, a former Dallas County commissioner who participated in the talks.
"It was sort of like, 'Just do what we tell you to do, or else,' " said Mr. Jackson, now a Republican member of the Texas House. "I didn't find that acceptable."
Margaret Keliher, the county judge at the time, said neither Jerry Jones, the Cowboys' owner, nor his son Stephen, the team's executive vice president, ever met with her, preferring to do business through consultants and lawyers.
"I found that kind of offensive," said Ms. Keliher.
Mr. Jackson, among others, questions whether the Cowboys ever intended to move to Fair Park. "I do kind of wonder if ... they weren't just playing a game with Dallas," he said.
Nonsense, said Brett Daniels, a spokesman for the Cowboys.
"We were very sincere in our efforts in trying to bring a new stadium to Dallas," he said. "Despite efforts on both sides to reach some kind of agreement, eventually there came a time to move forward elsewhere."
He said team executives didn't care to rehash the failed negotiations. "We're looking forward to our future in Arlington, not looking back." He added, "We believe that this facility will benefit not just Arlington, but the entire region."
Mr. Kirk, who left office in 2001 to run for the U.S. Senate, said the Cowboys were talking about a move to Dallas as early as the late 1990s. That's when Mr. Kirk, as mayor, was working on getting American Airlines Center built as the home of the Dallas Mavericks and Dallas Stars.
"I never had a conversation with Jerry Jones during all that time when he didn't say: 'Mr. Mayor, don't spend all of your money on the Stars and Mavericks. Save some for us,' " Mr. Kirk recalled.
In the stadium negotiations, the Cowboys chiefly dealt with the county, not the city. One reason was that there were, at least for a time, sites on the table that were in Dallas County but not within the Dallas city limits. Another is that the team was pushing a countywide increase in hotel and car rental taxes as the best way to raise $425 million toward a new stadium's cost.
But still another reason, one person close to the negotiations said, was that team representatives wanted to avoid a donnybrook with Mayor Laura Miller.
Miller a liability?
As a columnist for the Dallas Observer in the mid-1990s and later, as a City Council member, Ms. Miller railed against what she called the lopsided deal the city made to pay for American Airlines Center. She saw the use of tax money for the arena as a public subsidy for money-grubbing multimillionaire developers.
When it came time for the Cowboys to begin talks about a home in Dallas, said a Cowboys supporter familiar with the negotiations, "Our attitude was: Laura Miller, please stay out of this. We don't want you, we don't need you, don't interfere.
There was another concern, as well. The Cowboys insisted that a stadium financing referendum go before voters in the November 2004 general election. The conventional wisdom is that it's easier for naysayers to defeat such measures in special elections, when the turnout is much smaller.
But the conventional wisdom is also that referendums for new sports stadiums typically bring out a "Bubba" voter – young, male, blue-collar, and more likely than not Democratic. To some Republican officials, that was a potential problem.
In 2004, a presidential election year, GOP candidates found themselves in some hotly contested races. Danny Chandler was facing Democrat Lupe Valdez in the election for Dallas County sheriff. Republican Pete Sessions was squaring off against Democrat Martin Frost in a congressional race.
"The election of a president and congressmen and sheriffs is more important in the long run than a football stadium," Mr. Jackson said in the spring of 2004. He and other Republicans on the Commissioners Court opposed putting the Cowboys' question on the November ballot.
In a recent interview, Mr. Jackson acknowledged that he was worried about influencing the November turnout in favor of Democrats. But more important, he said, he didn't think the Cowboys had provided enough financial details to make a sound decision in time for the fall ballot.
"My position was if it was a good deal, Republicans would vote for it." In any case, she said, she didn't like being pressured by the Cowboys for a November vote.
"If it was a good deal in November, why wasn't it a good deal later on?"
But the Cowboys didn't wait.
Heading west
In the spring of 2004, team representatives imposed a June 30 deadline for a commitment from Dallas County – a deadline the county commissioners called unreasonable.
As the deadline neared, the team, sensing an impasse, ended the talks.
They took their ball to Arlington.
Ms. Miller, according to news reports at the time, gave it one last try. In July, she met with Jerry Jones and Stephen Jones.
"We couldn't agree," she said afterward.
"They made it very clear that they were going to find a town that would pay for a significant amount of the stadium. I made it clear that we weren't willing to pay for half their stadium."
The mayor added, "I have no regrets that they went to Arlington. It's too rich for me."
Even without the Cowboys, most people say, the Cotton Bowl is worth saving. All by itself, they say, the annual football game between the University of Texas and the University of Oklahoma, played during the State Fair, sprinkles enough cash on the city to justify continued improvements to the stadium. There's also the annual game between Grambling State University and Prairie View A&M.
"The Cotton Bowl has a relevant future in Dallas," said Mr. Kirk, the former mayor. "It can continue to be an important part of the State Fair and of the future of the Fair Park neighborhood for many years to come."
But wouldn't it have been better to have all that the stadium now offers, plus the Dallas Cowboys?
"That's like saying, 'Wouldn't I be in better shape if I'd quit eating donuts 10 years ago,' " he said.
"In retrospect, obviously it would have been better. But there's nothing we can do about that now. We can't put the genie back in the bottle."