Who Dey
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- Mar 18, 2019
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Paul Brown Stadium, where the Bengals play, is owned by Hamilton County, which means the Bengals and the county have a financial arrangement. But the county doesn’t want the taxpayers to know all the details of that arrangement.
The Cincinnati Enquirer reports that the county is refusing to divulge information such as how much taxpayers might have to pay to buy property for a Bengals practice facility, which is part of the arrangement between the team and the county.
When the newspaper put in a public records request for documents related to the negotiations between the Bengals and the county, the county produced 275 pages of documentation — almost all of which were blacked out entirely, with the county claiming all of the documentation is privileged information that can be redacted under the state’s open records law.
When a deal is finalized it will become public record, and taxpayers can assess it. But redacting hundreds of pages is the kind of thing that leaves citizens thinking they’re getting the wool pulled over their eyes when sports teams and government entities make a deal.