You need to take a look at Cincinnati. What a mess! Mike Brown threatened to leave if he didn't get a new stadium, then the Reds jumped on the bandwagon and demanded a new stadium, as well. The stupid taxpayers of Hamilton County voted for a 1% sales tax increase to pay for them. Guess what? The tax revenue isn't even close to what they thought it would be. They were also going to develop the land around the stadiums, but never did. Cincinnati and Hamilton County are both in the red. Not much revenue is being generated by these white elephants. On the other side of the river, Kentucky is booming from their well-planned development -- all without sports stadiums.
I see. So we should look at how Cincinnati botched their deal, and use it as an example of how building a stadium with public money is a bad idea? No thanks. I'd rather look at all of the cities that have thriving sports teams with vibrant stadium venues as examples, not the few botches. Baltimore comes to mind. There is no reason why DC's baseball venue couldn't be just as successful as Baltimore's. DC would even have more convienent public transportation options.