Stadium deal doomed?

A stadium deal for Real Salt Lake could be dead by next week.

Salt Lake County's Debt Review Committee unanimously voted Tuesday that giving $30 million in hotel-tax revenue to help finance the $110 million soccer stadium in Sandy is a risky investment. Two members of the committee abstained from voting.

County Mayor Peter Corroon now must weigh the odds. He said he will decide early next week whether to recommend that the Salt Lake County Council commit public funding for the stadium.

"I'm not one who has never taken gambles in my life," Corroon said. "But if I don't think it's a risk worth taking, I won't."

Team owner Dave Checketts believes public funding for a stadium is not a gamble at all.

"There is little to no risk for the taxpayers of Salt Lake County," Checketts said in a written statement.

Even in the "unlikely" event that the team fails and abandons the stadium, Checketts said, the county still comes out on top: Salt Lake County would still hold "substantial assets" after the team leaves, including $13 million in land that will appreciate in value over the years and a shared parking lot with the South Towne Exposition Center.

The team would also have to pay the county $10 million if it moves within 30 years, if Corroon were to approve the deal.

But that wasn't enough to sway the Debt Review Committee. The team's weaknesses far outweighed the strengths, according to the committee's recommendation to Corroon.

The deal-breaker for committee chairman Larry Richardson was that he believes Real won't be able to pay off its debts. The committee based its decision on a financial model that blended the team's projections with figures from an independent financial consultant.

According to the committee's financial model, the team wouldn't have enough money to pay its $3.3 million in yearly debt obligations in four out of the next seven years.

"That's the problem there — they end up with so much debt and so much debt service," said Richardson, who also serves as county treasurer. "I said from the get-go, if it didn't cover the debt service, I couldn't vote for it."

Real Salt Lake leaders believe that they can make more than enough money through ticket sales and concerts at the stadium to pay off the debt.

The committee, however, didn't believe all of Real's "sunny" concert assumptions, said Doug Willmore, the county's chief administrative officer.

The committee's hybrid financial model cut the team's concert projections in half: The team forecast 11 to 18 concerts a year, but the committee predicted four to 11 a year. The committee also shaved the team's concert-attendance projections by 5,500 fans.