The Miami Dolphins are in a political two-minute drill: Using mailers, commercials and staged events, trying to motivate voters to approve the county's plan to renovate Sun Life Stadium.
"The plan to modernize Sun Life Stadium would bring Super Bowls, international soccer and college championships," says a television ad.
"And it's not gonna cost Miami-Dade residents a nickel, because our share is paid for by tourists," says a radio commercial.
Unlike other stadium deals, the plan to renovate Sun Life Stadium must be approved by the voters. Now, the Dolphins have no choice but to pull out all the stops, trying to persuade voters to help them pay for a stadium makeover.
"They have to overcome the sense that another multi-millionaire wants us to raise money to pay millionaires to play a game," said Florida International University professor Charles Zelden.
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The Dolphins are running almost unopposed. There are no commercials airing that urge people to vote no, and Norman Braman seems to be the only opposition.
"We went through that hot air with the Marlins and we're hearing today the same hot air from the Miami Dolphins," Braman said previously.
The public widely sees the Marlins ballpark deal as a ripoff of taxpayer money, and now, says Zelden, the Dolphins have to fight the public mood, poisoned already by the Marlins.
"They're so angry,they're so frustrated,that they are going to vote against it," Zelden said. "What the Dolphins have to do is find a counterweight to that, they gotta get people excited."
Assuming the state legislature approves a sales tax rebate for the Dolphins, part of the funding plan, the referendum on the deal.
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Photo Credit: Miami Dolphins