NYC CONTROLLER SAYS DOMED YANKS STADIUM COST TOO MUCH

     New York City Comptroller Alan Hevesi, the city's top fiscal
officer, said yesterday that the $1B plan to build a new stadium
for the Yankees on Manhattan's West Side "isn't even in the
ballpark" of what the city can afford, according to David Lewis
of the N.Y. DAILY NEWS.  Hevesi, a possible Democratic mayoral
candidate, said the plan to build a domed stadium over the W.
33rd Street rail yards would "intensify" the city's debt crisis
and take public dollars from schools and hospitals.  Hevesi
proposed a city supported renovation of Yankee Stadium and the
surrounding Bronx neighborhood.  The DAILY NEWS' Lewis notes that
Hevesi's stance is "another hurdle" for a plan touted by NYC
Mayor Rudolph Giuliani to lure Yankees Owner George Steinbrenner
if he decides to leave the Bronx when his lease expires in 2002.
Hevesi would have to approve any borrowing to finance a new park,
and called Giuliani's claim that a facility could be built with
private money, "not tenable" (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 11/14).