Field of Schemes is a play-by-play account of how the drive for new sports stadiums and arenas drains $2 billion a year from public treasuries for the sake of private profit. While the millionaires who own sports franchises have seen the value of their assets soar under this scheme, taxpayers, urban residents, and sports fans have all come out losers, forced to pay both higher taxes and higher ticket prices for seats that, thanks to the layers of luxury seating that typify new stadiums, usually offer a worse view of the action.
The stories in Field of Schemes, from Baltimore to Cleveland and Minneapolis to Seattle and dozens of places in between, tell of the sports-team owners who use their money and their political muscle to get their way, and of the stories of spirited local groups-like Detroit's Tiger Stadium Fan Club and Boston's Save Fenway Park!-that have fought to save the games we love and the public dollars our cities need.
This revised and expanded edition features the first comprehensive reporting on the recent stadium battles in Washington DC, New York City, and Boston as well as updates on how cities have fared with the first wave of new stadiums built in recent years.
Neil deMause is a Brooklyn-based journalist who writes regularly for the Village Voice, Extra!, and Baseball Prospectus and runs the stadium-watch Web site fieldofschemes.com.
Joanna Cagan is a teacher and writer in New York City. She has written for numerous publications, including the Village Voice, the New York Times Magazine, and Interview.