Braves stadium bridge delays affirms need for public scrutiny

Cobb County taxpayers found out last week there isn’t going to be a bridge to unveil alongside the Atlanta Braves’ new stadium. At least not in 2017, when the team opens its first season in SunTrust Park.

Cobb Commission Chairman Tim Lee’s announcement of a construction delay is not a surprise.

Paying for and building a pedestrian bridge spanning I-285 that would provide a link to the stadium and its mixed-use development is complicated logistical and financial business. Delivering the structure at the speed and price promised was questionable from the start.

So question it we did.

One of our most important duties as watchdog journalists is to vet Cobb’s unprecedented public investment in the stadium, its surrounding infrastructure and its considerable public safety needs. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has similarly scrutinized stadium deals in Atlanta and Gwinnett. Another deal just recently emerged in DeKalb County for a practice facility for Atlanta Falcons owner Arthur Blank and his professional soccer team.

In each case, our goal is simple. We want to explain to taxpayers whether the performance of these projects are living up to the promise.

It’s been nearly two years since the baseball world shifted forever in metro Atlanta.

I doubt few of us will forget that November morning when the Atlanta Braves revealed what we now know was a big secret held among a small group. The team would be leaving Turner Field in downtown Atlanta, it’s home since 1997, for a new, $622 million Cobb County stadium. Cobb taxpayers would commit at least $368 million toward stadium construction. The Braves would commit even more in building the stadium and developing a mixed-use development around it to make it a year-round attraction.

For many Cobb residents the excitement — and disbelief — has barely diminished.

But neither have the questions, about traffic, parking, pedestrian access, public safety and more. Among the biggest questions is how the county would build a bridge that would span one of the busiest interstate highways in America to connect the stadium to the Cobb Galleria’s parking and amenities.

The bridge delay, the uncertainty of its funding and the questions about whether it’s even necessary underscores the importance of transparency with so much at stake.

It’s not always popular to question a project packed with so much promise: new revenue pumping into Cobb County; job creation; national exposure; Major League cool.

Perhaps because there are so many potential benefits, scrutiny is sometimes confused as opposition. Lee, who has taken to refusing to speak to the AJC, apparently holds that view.

But despite Lee’s resistance to answering questions about the stadium — or anything else when the question is from the AJC — the newspaper has managed to lead the way in posing the urgent questions that continue to emerge surrounding stadium development.

Here’s a sampling of the headlines generated by Cobb County Watchdog reporter Dan Klepal and others.

• Nov. 11, 2014: "Taxpayers' share of Braves bridge could rise"

And, finally, last week's headline: "Cobb delays Braves' bridge."

The bridge development affirms something common among all the stadium projects: sometimes there is great distance between plans on the drawing board and the ability to pull them off.

In Cobb, DeKalb, Gwinnett and Atlanta there is great expectation from a paying public to deliver what’s promised. At stake is a roughly $1 billion investment in stadium construction and related costs to these projects. Separately, there is a running tab for maintenance and support services that will run over the life span of these facilities. Taxpayers demand to know what’s being spent and whether the return on investment is adequate.

That leads us back to Lee.

The Cobb commission chairman pulled off the biggest economic development deal in the county’s history when he and commissioners committed taxpayers to spending more than $300 million on the stadium.

It could turn out to be a spectacular success. Partnerships with Comcast, Live Nation and Omni hotels bode well for what Cobb and the Braves are attempting to do, which is to create an experience beyond baseball that is sustainable throughout the year. There is a possibility the stadium could be finished early and under budget, which would inspire more public confidence.

Even so, the details matter. Taxpayers expect the AJC and the rest of the local media to pay attention to the details. Especially the messy ones, such as the deteriorating rationale behind delivering a pedestrian bridge on time and within cost parameters.