Atlanta Braves - Spring Training Stadium in West Villages?

If you follow the local news, then this isn't news to you. Yesterday and again today the Sarasota Herald Tribune has been reporting that negotiations between the Atlanta Braves, WVID, and "local leaders" are underway to build a brand new 7,500 seat baseball stadium in WVID.

In the artist rendition of what such a stadium might look like you can see that it could front on US 41 and would be just east of the State College of Florida campus which is shown in the upper right corner of the picture.

Estimated cost....$100 million

Who pays to build it? Now that is the question!!

According to the article published today, the funding would come from public bond funds issued to the WVID. Why WVID? Well because most government entities have charters or other regulations that restrict the amount of public bond debt they can incur WITHOUT public approval (a vote by the voters who will pay the taxes that repay the bond debt). However, as a state chartered Special Taxing District, WVID has the luxury of incurring unlimited amounts of bond debt subject only to the Board of Supervisors approval.

Bond debt is customarily incurred by WVID to pay for infrastructure improvements such as roads, parks, water, sewer, etc. Is a sports complex to the tune of $100 million really an "infrastructure" improvement for the district?? Only the voters can decide that....OH, sorry; the WVID voters are the land owners (read master developer) and it looks like they have already decided.

I'm not for or against the idea of a spring training facility in our backyard. But I am concerned with who is going to be paying for it, and right now that isn't clear.

This is the article from the http://www.heraldtribune.com.

Link to the article:
http://G52-SHweb.newscyclecloud.com/article/2016160309658