Transportation aid is 'important element' in Lambeau project: Harlan

Published: September 15, 2000

Sept. 15, 2000 Green Bay Packers President Bob Harlan said Friday that he hoped lawmakers would include $9.1 million in transportation aid for Lambeau Field in the state’s 2001-03 budget. “It’s an important element,” he said. But Harlan would not say whether the $295 million renovation project would be delayed if the funding were excluded from the bill. “That’s very difficult to answer at this time,” he said, stressing that the project needed to be completed on time to “keep up with other clubs.”

“It’s going to be a three-year project,” Harlan said. “We’re hoping to start Jan. 1 and be open for the ’03 season.” Brown County voters on Sept. 12 approved a half-cent sales tax to rebuild the 43-year-old stadium. But the $295 million price tag does not include infrastructure work – such as access roads to the renovated stadium, and lawmakers aren’t missing the chance to turn the roadwork funding into a political skirmish. Almost immediately after the referendum passed, Gov. Tommy G. Thompson issued a statement blaming Senate Democrats for removing the funding from the stadium bill passed earlier this year. Rep. John Gard (R-Peshtigo), who is chairman of the Assembly Special Committee on the Renovation of Lambeau Field, issued similar commentary. “I was disappointed that the Senate Democrats failed to join the Assembly in supporting the transportation funding portions of the Lambeau Field renovation project last spring,” Gard said in his statement. “I hope they don’t let this opportunity pass them by again.” Governor ‘inappropriate’ But Sen. Brian Burke (D-Milwaukee) went on the defense, saying the governor should have been reveling in the referendum’s passage instead of playing party politics. “I think the governor’s comments were totally inappropriate,” Burke said. He also said Thompson’s and Gard’s remarks were false; the $9.1 million at issue had been removed from the bill before it reached the Senate, most likely because it could have placed the entire stadium bill in jeopardy. “There was no dollar figure appropriated in the Assembly bill,” he said. “The reason the Assembly probably removed the $9.1 million is because it became a lightning rod.” To that, Thompson’s press secretary agreed, but said the amount was not included because Senate Democrats made it clear that the bill then would not even be considered. And Tony Jewell said the Assembly bill did allow the stadium district authority to apply for transportation aid, a provision he said Senate Democrats removed.

“What they’re doing is playing election-year politics,” Jewell said, “and running away from their records.” Gard agreed: “They clearly drew a line in the sand. … Now that we’ve won, you see people jockeying to revise history.” Burke, who is Senate chairman of the Joint Committee on Finance, said that if the amount were included in the governor’s budget, as is likely, he would “consider it at that time.” He said the funding would be weighed against competing priorities and what the $9.1 million would be used for. Burke said initial negotiations between the administration and Packers management indicated the funds could be used for infrastructure work or a parking structure. “We need to know the nature of the expenditure,” he said. But Gard said the nature of the expenditure is known. “It would be for any of those infrastructure improvements around the facility that would ease traffic congestion and make it safer,” he said. That could include access roads and ways to improve parking but not the building of a parking structure. “I don’t think that’s anyone’s plans,” Gard said. Also a consideration, Burke acknowledged, is whether failing to approve funding would delay the opening of Lambeau Field. “That’s a factor we’d look at,” he said. Gard said that, with or without the funds, he expected Lambeau Field to open as scheduled. “Does that delay the project if it fails?” he said. “I don’t think so.”