With the Minnesota Legislature only one week away from ending its 2011 session and with the current proposal hinging on a local contribution to the project raised without a public vote that surely would fail, opponents of the stadium believe they’ve found a way to avoid the effort to avoid a vote.
Heron Marquez Estrada of the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that a new group of stadium foes, NoVikingsTax.com, believes that the “charter” nature of Minneapolis and Ramsey County permits a referendum on any local efforts to raise money via raise taxes to be placed onto a public ballot, if at least 10 percent of all registered voters sign a petition to that effect.
“We could usurp their usurpation,” said Chris David, head of the group.
It’s the kind of issue that seems destined for litigation, which could serve only to slow the project down even more.
Either way, the folks in Minnesota need to make a decision, and they need to make it soon. If they want to keep the Vikings, they need to find a way to build a stadium with a fair and appropriate public contribution to a venue that will benefit the public in various ways, including hosting a Super Bowl and other projects that will generate tax revenue and business activity. If they don’t want to keep the Vikings, then they need to do the same thing they’ve done for the last decade or longer -- nothing.