Friday, April 19, 2013
MSG gets $16M in tax breaks that won't end under Cuomo
From the Daily News:
Gov. Cuomo said he opposes efforts to revoke a lucrative city property tax hike for Madison Square Garden.
“I haven’t heard any argument that’s convincing for eliminating that,” Cuomo said Tuesday.
At an earlier press conference, Assemblyman David Weprin and Sen. James Sanders, both Queens Democrats, said they are pushing the bill to revoke the three-decade-old tax credit that saves the Garden an estimated $16 million a year because the cash-strapped city can use the money more than a rich corporation.
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver told the Daily News Monday that getting rid of the tax break would be “troubling.”
A spokesman for Mayor Bloomberg had no comment.
Common Cause/New York released an analysis that showed Cablevision, which purchased the Garden in 1994 but spun it off into a separate company in 2010 with the Dolans retaining a controlling interest in both companies, is a major campaign contributor to Cuomo and other key officials.
Cuomo, the top individual recipient of Cablevision donations since 2005, has received $359,150 as governor an additional $50,100 as attorney general from the company.
Former Cuomo aide Irene Baker last year left the administration to join MSG as its senior vice president for government affairs.
From CBS New York:
Silver told the News the deal is to encourage development.
The tax break has been in place since 1982.
1) Yes, developers need to be "encouraged."
2) MSG is already developed.
3) If the tax break is eliminated, they won't be going anywhere.
4) Cuomo is a bullsh*t reformer.
7 comments:
As expected.
The Gov has been close buddies with the Dolan mob for years. Both are big players on the summer Hamptons scene
The more things change, the more they remain the same...
The USTA takes up over 40 acres of parkland and all they pay to the city is about $2.4 million a year. Also, their lease allows them to not pay real estate taxes.
And now the Wilpon's want to take more parkland for their own use. If they get their way a shopping mall will be built in the CitiField parking lot and they will get to make even more cash on the backs on NYC taxpayers through even more tax breaks.
These venues bring in a lot of money...for "them"!!!
"Also, their lease allows them to not pay real estate taxes."
It's not their lease, The USTA is a bona fide not-for-profit, as is NASCAR, The NFL & Major League Baseball. It's bullshit, but until we straighten this out they'll all get away with this. Church's also qualify as not-for-profits. All those pop-up Korean houses of worship in Queens are legitimate non profits... Tax all of 'em and take a chunk out of the national deficit...
Or give cablevision subscribers in NYC the tax break instead. Let the owners (Cablevision)of MSG pay their taxes, come on Sheldon thief Sheldon Silver and wiggy boy Weprin stop being so protective of your benefactors - the Dollans.
Corporate welfare at its worst! See how much money the Dolans of MSG give to both Shelly Silver and Andrew Cuomo. Bought and owned!
If this doesn't beg for public financing of elections then nothing does...and not phoney NYC matching funds system!
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