James Cassella, Mayor, East Rutherford

(This is not a legal transcript. Bloomberg LP cannot guarantee its accuracy.)

JAMES CASSELLA, MAYOR, EAST RUTHERFORD, IS INTERVIEWED ON BLOOMBERG TV

JANUARY 19, 2012

SPEAKERS: MARGARET BRENNAN, BLOOMBERG NEWS ANCHOR

JAMES CASSELLA, MAYOR, EAST RUTHERFORD

10:46

MARGARET BRENNAN, BLOOMBERG NEWS ANCHOR: With me for the latest in our deep in-debt series is East Rutherford Mayor, James Cassella.

Mr. Mayor, welcome to "InBusiness." How much money are we talking about here?

JAMES CASSELLA, MAYOR, EAST RUTHERFORD: Well, we're talking their taxes would be approximately $1.5 million.

BRENNAN: One point five million dollars and this is specific to the training facility, not the stadium?

CASSELLA: Not the stadium. It's the offices, the Timex Performance Center, which includes the corporate offices, the locker rooms, training facilities and the ball fields, the practice fields.

BRENNAN: The practice fields. Well, the Giants brokered this deal in the 1970s. What is it that you want to change about the structure of that?

CASSELLA: They built this. They own the building outright. They built it with their money - private money. There are no public moneys that were used to build this facility.

It's totally different than what the original concept of the sports authority was. Originally, their offices were in Giants stadium. And that building was owned by the state of New Jersey.

This was a building that was constructed, as I said, with private moneys owned by the New York Giants.

BRENNAN: And so because unlike the stadium which is owned by the city or the state, these are offices you consider private. You want them to pay a regular rate of tax?

CASSELLA: Yes.

BRENNAN: And...

CASSELLA: Well, let me just correct you on one thing. The stadium is also owned by a private entity.

BRENNAN: OK, do you want to tax the stadium as well now?

CASSELLA: That we will see how we make out in this particular suit that is going on here, or this court action that's going on right now.

But we also believe that the stadium should be taxed because it was built with private moneys. But that's a different entity. That's a corporation formed by the New York Jets and the New York Giants.

BRENNAN: Wow. And so you would possibly be considering asking for a tax revenue off of that. How much money would we be talking about for the stadium?

CASSELLA: It's hard to give an exact figure. But my best guess would be probably somewhere around $12 million, somewhere in that area.

BRENNAN: And what does the city need this money for?

CASSELLA: It's not a question of it would be extra money coming in. What would happen is, the property taxes for all the other property owners would be reduced.

It's not a windfall where on top of money that we are already getting, we're going to receive $12 or $15 million more or in the Timex Center, case (ph) $1.5 million more.

It's spread out throughout not only the municipality but also the county. And it reduces the taxes for everyone else. So in essence, what is going on here is we're fighting for all the property owners except the New York Giants who own this facility.

And so the state supports, well, in the instance of Mr. Tish, a billionaire owner and a professional football team that tolls (ph) out millions of dollars in contracts to their ballplayers.

BRENNAN: Right.

CASSELLA: But when it comes to paying taxes, that would reduce the taxes for all the other property owners. They are saying no, we do not want to pay this.

So really, in essence, it's not, as I say, a windfall. All it is is a reduction for everyone else. The simplest way to put it - if you have a dollar bill and four people are contributing to that dollar, it would be a quarter each.

If a fifth person came in and contributed, it would reduce everybody to down to 20 cents. And that's really how it would work. We'd still be...

BRENNAN: Right.

CASSELLA: ...the dollar that we needed. But it would be spread out over more taxpayers. What it does is it increases your ratable base, which, in essence, lowers your tax rate.

BRENNAN: Is it worth risking, disrupting that plan to have the Super Bowl held at that stadium in 2014? It'll bring money into the city.

CASSELLA: Not really. It doesn't bring anything into the municipality. It does some of the businesses. The restaurants and the hotels, obviously, are going to have a windfall during...

BRENNAN: Right.

CASSELLA: ...probably the week leading up to it. But let's be honest. A lot of the activity is going to be taking place in New York City. And so as far as a windfall for the municipality, no.

In fact, it will mean that we'll have another weekend...

BRENNAN: Yes.

CASSELLA: ...of traffic and our services being used to control the traffic and some of the things going on outside of the stadium.

BRENNAN: All right, well, Mr. Mayor, we're going to watch it and see how this dispute moves forward. Appreciate your time explaining it to us (ph).

CASSELLA: Oh, thank you very much and hopefully, we have an answer soon.

BRENNAN: All right, one and a half million dollars there potentially in that tax revenue.

10:51

***END OF TRANSCRIPT***

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