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September 26, 2009
Nets principal owner believes sale of club means new home for NBA club
The Canadian Press
By Tom Canavan
Mikhail Prokhorov's guest for dinner in Moscow on that July evening was Bruce Ratner, an American real estate developer - and owner of an NBA team.
Ratner, the principal owner of the New Jersey Nets, needed money to build his US$4.9 billion vision dubbed Atlantic Yards, which would include a new $800 million Brooklyn home for the team. Prokhorov, a lover of the game who owns a share of a successful Russian pro team, also had a dream: To own a team in the NBA, home of the world's best basketball.
It would take some of his $9.5 billion fortune to get it done.
...
There are three obstacles that stand in the way: Completing the tax-exempt bond deal, dealing with the challenge to the use of eminent domain, and getting the sale of the team approved by three-quarters of the NBA's 30 teams, something that seems likely with commissioner David Stern on board.
Ratner is confident about getting the bonds.
"We feel quite good about that because the markets have returned," he said, adding that he is meeting with rate agencies and expects to have everything done within three weeks.
New York's Court of Appeals is to hear an eminent domain challenge to the project next month. Ratner said the project is on solid legal ground.
"You have to have a situation where the court of appeals would have to reverse the eminent domain laws that have been around a very long time and that have been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. It's not very likely," he said.
But Daniel Goldstein, spokesman for the opposition group Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn, said that even if Ratner won the suit that he will not be able to break ground in 2009 because the properties he needs to demolish won't come into his possession until next year.
Goldstein also disputed that the court is being asked to reverse eminent domain laws, noting that the appeals court is being asked to rule upon the meaning of public use as it exists in the New York State Constitution.
Posted by steve at September 26, 2009 7:40 AM