Mayor Ballard Takes Stand Against City Taxpayers

I was extremely surprised to see city lawyers filing to dismiss the lawsuit my law firm filed on behalf of Indianapolis taxpayers’ lawsuit to obtain a return of millions of dollars that Sports Corporation should have paid to the City pursuant to the terms of the original 1985 agreement. It would have been one thing for the Sports Corporation to have filed such a motion on its own. But for City Legal, with attorneys paid for with taxpayer dollars, to spend countless hours at taxpayer expense working with the Sports Corporation to prepare and file such a motion against Indianapolis taxpayers, is rubbing the salt in the wounds of people already overtaxed due to this city's giveaways.

I would point out that this action comes at the very same time when the city is desperate for money because another public-private partnership, Lucas Oil Stadium, is “bleeding cash.” This was an easy political issue for the Mayor. The decision to do this deal was made at the 11th hour by Mayor Peterson’s people. The City-County Council was kept completely in the dark. While I’m sure Mayor Ballard is telling the truth that he was told of the deal, I highly doubt they told Mayor Ballard the deal to reduce the plaza requirement had a $6 million fiscal impact. After all, the Peterson people did not even bother to include that little fact in the resolution introduced at the Metropolitan Development Commission.

One thing that is missed in all this is why the City and the Sports Corporation would attempt to dismiss the case at this stage, a very unusual move. I would suggest the obvious: the City and the Sports Corporation are taking this action now because they want to avoid going through the discovery process which will likely lead to full disclosure of all the facts behind the deal, including the people who profited. Instead of doing the right thing now and lean on the Sports Corporation to cough up the money, Mayor Ballard has chosen to take a political bullet for the former Mayor by taking, at taxpayer expense no less, a stand against city taxpayers and in favor of corporate welfare.

I can only guess that such extremely foolish political advice comes from some of Mayor Ballard’s close advisors who also were eating from the City’s corporate welfare trough before Mayor Ballard was elected, quite possibly people who profited directly or indirectly from the Pan Am deal, or perhaps who sit on the board of the Sports Corporation. It’s a shame because those conflicted advisors he leans on have little, if any, interest in the Mayor's political future, certainly less than Republicans like myself who are left in a position of sharply criticizing a Mayor we so want to support. If Mayor Ballard had any idea how angry members of his own party are at him, including most of the very people who helped him get elected, perhaps he would choose a wiser political course.