Sixers Arena: Lots of leadership missing, and that’s no accident

[This was published in the Inquirer on Thursday, Dec, 12. The subject is the Sixers Arena, but whose leadership does it mean? Interspersed are comments on another bill Council bullied through to passage in less than three months.]

“A Failure of leadership”

by The Editorial Board

After all the shouting, little has changed in the nearly two and a half years since the 76ers first proposed building a $1.3 billion arena that is expected to transform a forlorn section of Center City.

[The Gallery also was expected  to transform a forlorn stretch of Market East into a thriving commercial corridor. It failed. And it was open 7 days a week, while a Sixers Arena would be used 41 times a season for home games. So this location benefits who, really?]

Instead of striking a grand bargain that was a win-win-win for the Sixers, neighboring Chinatown, and the city, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker, City Council, and the team owners instead forced the arena down everyone’s throat.

There was a pretense of a process, but it was largely a sham.

Sure, there were studies and public hearings. But it was all stage-managed. Little new ground was broken. No hearts or minds were changed.

Instead, the opposing sides largely talked past each other.

[The Inquirer seems to be surprised there was gambling at Rick’s Cabaret, as surprised as Steve Lopez was when he arrived in Philly to find legal parking in the middle of South Broad Street.]

As the initial vote in City Council neared, the focus turned to getting the Sixers to increase the $50 million they offered to offset the community impact of the arena. Council pushed for the Sixers to give $100 million. A coalition of groups opposed to the project asked for $300 million. [The Sixers are paying $193 million to Joel Embiid for three years, and he is refusing to play in back to back games.]

In the end, the Sixers increased the community benefits agreement (CBA) to $60 million. But even before the Sixers agreed to up the ante, Council was busy divvying up the spoils. Who got what appeared ad hoc and came too little, too late.

That’s because Parker had already quietly negotiated with the Sixers — without Chinatown at the table. She revealed the deal in September in what looked more like a hostage video than a grand announcement.

[In an identical move, behind drawn curtains, City Council in September  launched an ungrammatical scheme, “Get Out the Bike Lanes” scheme to do the unthinkable, while breaking a mayoral pledge. The pledge was Michael Nutter’s, made to residents along Pine and Spruce, when bike lanes were to be tried out, that they would always have access to their homes, meaning they could stop to pick up or discharge passengers, and receive deliveries. A new bill, sponsored by Council President Kenyatta Johnson destroyed that promise, on the false notion it would create safety. The bill was pushed, starting in August by the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia following the tragic death of a bicyclist on Spruce Street by an alleged drunk driver. The death had nothing at all to do with a car stopped in the bike lane. The Coalition produced zero reports of injuries to cyclists by stopped vehicles.]

In doing so, the mayor steered a chunk of the CBA funds to her own pet projects: $7 million for year-round public schools and $4.5 million for an untested program to train residents for city jobs.

Only $6.3 million of the initial $50 million was earmarked for Chinatown. This adds insult to the betrayal many in the neighborhood feel since they stand to be the most negatively impacted.

Another $1 million was added to city parks and rec center renovations, $1 million was slated for an apprentice and workforce development program, and $3.5 million went to a nebulous program, formerly known as the Mayor’s Fund, to “support the children of Philadelphia.”

Sprinkling around the CBA funds to a bunch of unrelated projects assures the impact will be nanoscopic. Even worse, the spending will lack much oversight or accountability.

[After its win banning all stopping, the Bicycle Coalition revealed its next goal — barriers between bike lanes and car lanes, further impeding traffic and creating major inconveniences for auto drivers, which are the vast majority in the city. But City Council has ignored the rights of motorists.] 

For their part, the opposition leaders failed to grasp that once Parker won the Democratic mayoral primary in May 2023 with the backing of the building trades union, the arena’s construction was all but assured.

Instead of trying to negotiate the best possible deal, opposition leaders in Chinatown remained a hard no. Understandably, in their minds, no amount of money was worth losing their neighborhood.

From the beginning, this board urged the city, the Sixers, and community groups to work together to find a way to make the arena a win for everyone.

The East Market Street corridor has vexed city officials for decades. Leveraging more than $1 billion in private investment into a larger plan to remake Market Street and grow neighboring Chinatown could have resulted in a widely beneficial deal.

But instead of trying to work with Chinatown and other opposition groups, the mayor and City Council worked around them. This is a failure of leadership. Parker and Council are elected to represent all city residents — not just three billionaires. [The majority of Philadelphians oppose the arena, per a recent poll. ]

For their part, the Sixers admirably began the process by committing to pay for the arena without asking for city tax dollars — as has been the case with other stadium projects. The team is funding the CBA and set aside $2 million  to help Black-owned businesses become vendors and suppliers at the arena.

But the battle lines quickly became drawn, making it difficult to win over doubters who have legitimate concerns about traffic, parking, and gentrification.

Looming over the process was the unstated threat that the Sixers could move to Camden. New Jersey officials offered $400 million in state subsidies to build the arena, and another $400 million to build an adjacent mixed-use development.

After all the time and talk, the arena deal passed largely as it was initially proposed. City Council voted 12-4 on Thursday to give initial approval to the legislation that clears the way for construction to begin.

Councilmembers Nicolas O’Rourke, Jeffery Young Jr., Rue Landau, and Jamie Gauthier voted against it. In a profile in cowardice, Councilmember Kendra Brooks was a no-show.

While Council is expected to give final approval to the arena deal next Thursday, many details and questions remain — along with some bruised feelings in a city deeply divided over the proposal.

Going forward, the city needs to come up with a better process for large development deals. For starters, projects can’t be controlled by a district councilmember. Community input should not be ignored.

The arena deal could have been better and less contentious if the mayor used the “convening power” she often references to bring everyone together to map a broader vision for Market Street and Chinatown beyond the arena.

For starters, the deal made more sense when it included an apartment tower that would have added residents to the neighborhood who would have supported surrounding businesses and spurred other development along Market Street.

Much more effort should have gone into finding ways to protect and even grow Chinatown — instead of just throwing a couple of million dollars its way. For example, capping the Vine Street Expressway and redeveloping the Roundhouse could enable Chinatown to grow to the north and east.

Other creative solutions could have been found just by listening.

“All kinds of things open up when you do something with the community and not to it,” Shanée Garner, the executive director of Lift Every Voice Philly, who opposed the arena, said in a meeting with the Editorial Board.

When Parker announced the arena deal in September, she looked into the camera and told Chinatown residents, “I see you.”

But Parker had her eyes on the arena the whole time.

[My notion of failed leadership is not just Council and the Sixers and the mayor — it is also the newspaper of record that did not use its reporting and opinion sources to galvanize opposition to a project from most of those who live closest to it, and who will suffer the most from it. Council and the mayor. In both cases, were transfixed by ludicrous arguments and bright shiny objects.]