« The Times corrects the "Atlantic Yards" caption | Main | More details emerge on Yankees lobbying efforts re tax-free bonds »
September 15, 2008
Rep. Charles Rangel lobbied IRS for tax breaks on behalf of Yankees
NY Daily News
by Greg B. Smith
Sure, unemployment is at its highest level in five years, the global financial system is falling apart, millions are without power along the Gulf Coast, and that knock at your door is probably someone serving you with a foreclosure notice. But don't worry — your elected officials are hard at work making sure that you and me and our fellow taxpayers are picking up a big chunk of the tab for billionaire team owners.
This must-read article shows just how deeply entwined city and state officials and sports and development interests really are — and how the system is rigged for the benefit of the wealthy and powerful.
The city and the Yankees secretly crafted a letter Rep. Charles Rangel used to lobby the IRS for tax changes that would save the team $66 million, the Daily News has learned.
They did this at the same time Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and the team's law firm, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, raised almost $25,000 for Rangel, records show.
The law firm's political action committee also donated an additional $30,000 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in this election cycle. Rangel is chairman of the DCCC's board of directors and a key fund-raiser for House Democrats. Yankees President Randy Levine is senior counsel at Akin Gump.
The Rangel letter was just one weapon in the Yankees' ongoing battle to get more tax-exempt financing for the new stadium rising in the Bronx. Last year, the team got $942 million in tax-free bonds through a city agency, but the team wants $350 million more.
If the new bonds go through, the Yankees would lower their borrowing costs by $66 million on top of the $181 million they're already set to save from the first round of tax-free bonds, the Independent Budget Office estimates.
...Levine said the firm had nothing to do with the Rangel letter and insisted the letter was meant to serve the interests of the Yankees and other projects, such as the Mets' new stadium and developer Bruce Ratner's proposed Nets' arena in Brooklyn.
Mets officials said they had nothing to do with the letter.
A spokesman for Ratner did not return calls.
Posted by eric at September 15, 2008 9:29 AM