The Opinion of the RGJ Editorial Board

Efforts to lure the Oakland Raiders may require Northern Nevada lawmakers to sign off on potentially $750 million in taxpayer money for a domed stadium intended to seal the deal.

This explains why Raiders officials visited Reno this month and made a show of scouting possible training camp locations at the University of Nevada, Reno and elsewhere.

But area legislators should not be swayed. The deal is unlikely to bring the claimed benefits and has a good chance of creating harm if numerous other stadium projects are any indication.

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The Raiders moved from Oakland in the 1980s to Los Angeles and back in 1994. Now the NFL team wants a new stadium and is prepared to kick Oakland to the curb if it does not provide one.

Such behavior should set off alarm bells. A perfect storm of circumstances, though, is forming that could make approval for Las Vegas inevitable:

• For years, Las Vegas has actively sought a major professional sports team to expand its tourism base. City officials — especially Mayor Carolyn Goodman — have been effusive in their support to bring the Raiders.

• The University of Nevada, Las Vegas has been seeking a new stadium to replace the aging Sam Boyd Stadium — and it happens to own a $50 million plot of land that it could donate to the cause in exchange for getting to use a new facility built there.

• And casino giant Las Vegas Sands Corp. wants this deal to happen. Sands CEO Sheldon Adelson bought the Las Vegas Review-Journal in December, and the influential newspaper has been pushing approval. One editorial was headlined “No place like dome: Stadium proposal a must-do.”

Here’s how the stadium funding would break down: the Raiders pay $500 million, the Sands $150 million and taxpayers $750 million.

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The taxpayer money would come from incremental tax revenue tied to an increase in the hotel room tax. Tax increases require action from the Legislature.

Roger Noll — a Stanford professor emeritus specializing in the economics of sports — says, “NFL stadiums do not generate significant local economic growth, and the incremental tax revenue is not sufficient to cover any significant financial contribution by the city.”

In an article last year, Noll “pointed out the cities of Oakland and St. Louis are still making substantial annual payments on the debts that remain for now-obsolete stadiums that were built to lure the Oakland Raiders and St. Louis Rams away from Los Angeles in the 1990s.”

Most economists don’t like stadium subsidies. A 2005 survey of a random sample of American Economic Association members found that 58 percent “strongly agreed” and 28 percent “agreed” that “Local and state governments in the U.S. should eliminate subsidies to professional sports franchises.” Only 5 percent disagreed.

Neil deMause, co-author of the book “Field of Schemes: How the Great Stadium Swindle Turns Public Money Into Private Profit,” told the Las Vegas Sun in May that he was strongly opposed to the $750 million public funding deal: “The question for me is not whether this is a bad deal for Nevada — it’s how bad of a deal.”

Even if one supports the idea of a Las Vegas Raiders, this deal is overinflated. The average NFL stadium subsidy is $262 million and, as RGJ sports writer Chris Murray points out, the trend is toward smaller public roles in funding stadiums, not larger.

Staunchly anti-tax lawmakers in Northern Nevada nonetheless expressed support for the Raiders deal. For example, Assemblyman Ira Hansen, R-Sparks, told RGJ political reporter Seth Richardson: “I was skeptical of this whole thing for a variety of reasons, but the more I hear about it the more I like it. The main thing is it’s going to be funded by room taxes, so, essentially, no citizens in Nevada will have to pay for it.”

He neglects the fact that room taxes benefit Nevadans, including up north. RGJ political columnist Jon Ralston wrote, “Most people don’t know that most of the room tax money does not go toward the convention authority in Vegas: It goes toward education. That’s right, 39 percent goes toward the Clark County School District (25 percent) and the state’s education account (14 percent).”

Also, room taxes support Interstate 15 improvements.

A KTNV/Rasmussen poll last month found 55 percent of Clark County voters “oppose pledging up to $500 million in public funds to help finance a stadium that could potentially bring an NFL team to Las Vegas, with 35 percent in favor and 10 percent undecided.”

Politicians should listen to economists and voters who think the Raiders stadium proposal is a bad idea.