Marc Lasry, one of the new owners of the Milwaukee Bucks, said an announcement regarding a site for a new arena for the basketball team will be made within 60 days.
Last year, the Bucks won 15 games and lost 67. Former U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl has since sold the team, but promised along with the new owners — Marc Lasry and Wes Edens — to put up about $200 million for a new arena that would replace the roughly 27-year-old Bradley Center.
Perhaps hundreds of millions more in funding will be needed for a new building, and the team is at least partly looking to taxpayers for funding.
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The Bucks’ relative lack of success over the last decade has soured some people on the franchise. As the NBA team gets ready for its first regular-season game on Wednesday night, Lasry said piling up wins right away is not essential to getting public money for the arena.
“People will buy into that if they feel that we’re spending the time and the money to improve,” said Lasry. “No one wants to start off poorly. But I think if you do, but people see progress, it’s fine.”
Lasry said the Bucks have spent a lot of money on a new coach and some new players, and have added about 40 employees to help improve the franchise. He said that the debate over public financing will ramp up after the proposed arena site is announced.
“The first step is, let’s find the space where we are going to put it,” said Lasry. “Then once we’re able to announce that, I think then we’ll figure out how we’ll end up paying for it. But I think the most important is we know we’ll end up building an arena here.”
The size of the geographic region that will be asked to help pay for the arena has also yet to be determined. Several counties surrounding Milwaukee have said the money won’t come from their taxpayers.
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