Venue News: Sporting KC Gives Away Stadium-Naming Rights

One way to make it nearly impossible for people to not support your sports team is to give your new stadium’s naming rights and a cut of your earnings to a cancer charity. And that’s exactly what the rebranded Sporting KC (formerly the Kansas City Wizards) did this week. In a historic deal with the Lance Armstrong Foundation, the club’s new $200 million stadium will be named Livestrong Sporting Park, and Sporting KC will also go so far as to give a portion of the money spent by every fan in the 18,500-seat stadium (25,000 seats for concerts) to the charity…

…San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders and Chargers President Dean Spanos this week explored alternatives to financing a new football stadium if funds from the NFL and downtown redevelopment evaporate. In their first meeting since October, according to a joint statement, Sanders, Spanos, city staff, and a former redevelopment chief reviewed the status of state efforts to eliminate redevelopment agencies and, with that, automatic access to downtown property taxes to cover what might be a $950 million project. They also took note of the NFL’s ongoing contract negotiations with players and the possibility that the league will not have funds available to help finance new stadiums, including one in San Diego…

… Five months ago, it was reported that, pending what became a rubber stamp from the board of trustees, the University of Nebraska would embark on a $55.5 million expansion of Memorial Stadium. The expanded stadium would have added roughly 5,000 seats to its current official capacity of just over 81,000. Thanks to interest from Cornhuskers fans, however, those initial plans are in the process of being tweaked. According to the Omaha World-Herald, the school will go to its board once again this week to ask that the money being devoted to the expansion be increased from the current figure to $63 million. The additional monies would allow the number of seats being added to go from 5,000 to 6,000…

…A court case that will decide whether East Rutherford, NJ, can collect property taxes from a New York Giants practice facility will likely come down to how a judge interprets legislation that established the Meadowlands Sports Complex 40 years ago. Both sides cited the New Jersey law many times in state Tax Court in Hackensack on Friday when Judge Joseph Andresini opened oral arguments. Local officials say they are owed $2.5 million in taxes and late fees for the Timex Performance Center, where the Giants practice. But attorneys for the team and its landlord, the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, say the law makes the facility tax-exempt…

…Residents in Talmadge, CA, have filed a lawsuit in San Diego County Superior Court to try to block the installation of stadium lights at Hoover High School. The lights, which would enable the school’s football team to play home games on Friday nights, are to be paid for using funds from Proposition S, a $2.1 billion bond measure passed by voters in November 2008. A hearing date has not been set. The attorney for a group calling itself Taxpayers for Accountable School Bond Spending claims the San Diego Unified School District duped the public before the election by burying the issue in the bond language. A school district spokeswoman disagreed.