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A Few Things I've Stolen (4)A Baseball Stadium |
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I’ve had some wonderful moments in my business career; like the time I quickly sold my stock in Harken right before their shares crashed ;) but the sweetest deal I ever did was the one where I got the City of Arlington to buy a football stadium for me and a few friends.It all started in 1988 when my buddy William De Witt Jr. started putting together a group of investors to buy the Texas Rangers baseball team. Bill was having a couple of problems with Major League Baseball Commissioner Peter Ueberroth on account of there weren’t any Texans involved. Naturally, what with me being a Texan, and the son of the Vice President into the bargain, Billy thought about me.
Now I only had about $606,000 to invest at the time but between being a Texan and the President’s kid, and the fact that Eddie Chiles who was thinking about selling happened to be an old family friend of the Bush’s, the group decided they needed me to get the deal pushed through. So they agreed that if it all came off they would give me an extra 10% of the shares for free.
The deal went through in March 1989 for $46 million.The Rangers were not exactly a cash cow at the time on account of we had the worst stadium in Major League baseball. It was actually a minor league stadium that had been revamped in the 70’s but lacked the modern day amenities that make the sport so profitable these days, like executive boxes.
We came up with a plan however to build a world class stadium with a classic retro design like those that were under construction in Baltimore and Cleveland. The best part, we would get the City of Arlington to pay for it by threatening to leave the area if they didn’t. We called it a public-private partnership which meant that the public would pay for the stadium we would privately own it. Arlington Mayor Richard Green campaigned aggressively for the deal and the good people of Arlington voted for it. Years later in March 2003 I appointed Richard as regional administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency. What comes around goes around.
We sold the Rangers to my friend and campaign contributor Tom Hicks in 2001. I got $16 million for my share. A tidy little profit on $606,000 I’m sure you’ll agree.
Incidentally while Governor I appointed Hicks as chairman of The University of Texas Investment Management Co. which manages the Permanent University Fund.
The committee was later charged with investing $1.7 billion of public university money in the form of investments in private companies. Almost a third of the $1.7 billion was committed to funds run by Hicks business associates.
Other Things I Have Stolen.
The Presidency of the United States of America, TWICE.
$2,000,000,000,000 of United States taxpayer’s money.
12 Billion Dollars worth of Iraqi Oil
The Ameriquest
Stadium.
The People of Arlington Paid for it.
I made $15 million out of it.