And That's A Bad Thing?

Populist New York Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez is up in arms over the cash waterfall in the deal to finance new parking garages at the new Yankee Stadium:

In other words, after the bondholders get theirs, after all the management fees for the garages and employee salaries and the maintenance and overhead is taken care of, then and only then will city taxpayers see a dime for all the land and financial support given to the new Yankee Stadium garages.

So the bondholders are putting up the money to build the garages, and they'd like to be repaid?  How greedy?

I have nothing but respect for social critics who want to engage in the battle over whether the United States devotes an absurd amount of public resources towards building sports facilities.  We do. 

But against that backdrop, the deals to build the new baseball stadiums in New York City are remarkably favorable to the public (one of the major reasons why they were awarded The Bond Buyer's Deal of the Year award last year).  Yes, the private sector gets paid, but that's because it's taking the risk.  On balance, not the worst tradeoff...