Gene Locke's Sports Authority Problem Resurfaces

If it wasn't bad enough the taxpayers may have to pay $4 million on one of the "it won't cost the taxpayers a penny" stadium deals, now we learn that the Sports Authority may need to scrape together an astounding $142 million. Houston mayoral candidate Gene Locke has been proudly touting his role in negotiating the stadium deal when he was City Attorney. After he left City Hall, he did the revolving door thing and picked up the Sports Authority as a client in his law practice.

Locke gives an extremely confusing explanation of the Sports Authority payback debacle in his interview with Kuff. On a side note, if Locke can understand the complicated machinations of the Sports Authority debt, why can't he understand the simple City budget shortfall gap? He accuses Parker of being confused and being quiet as a church mouse, but Parker has been reporting the budget shortfall all along, month after month, in her role as City Controller. As Erik says, it looks like Locke is the one that has been quiet as a church mouse over the stadium deals gone bad. And, on one other note, Locke states in his Kuff interview that the City should never go into the reserves, instead it should have a zero balanced budget. Really? Wheeler and dealer Locke on the stadiums that were heavily financed by debt that now is biting tax payers in the butt wants to zero balance the budget?

Would Locke make similar, confusing deals and promises if elected Mayor that will put future Houstonians on the hook for millions of dollars?