Report Claims Yankees Used Taxpayer Subsidies To Pay Execs

Report Claims Taxpayer Subsidies Helped Pay Salary Of Levine, Others

N.Y. taxpayers subsidized the salaries of “nearly a dozen top Yankees execs” from ’01-05 and paid “hundreds of thousands of dollars for lobbyists" for the new $1.3B Yankee Stadium, according to a report by civic watchdog group Good Jobs New York cited by Juan Gonzalez of the N.Y. DAILY NEWS.  The group said that the money came from a $5M annual “New Stadium” planning fund created by former N.Y. Mayor Rudy Giuliani near the end of his term.  The fund was financed with “credits City Hall let the Yankees deduct from annual rent payments on its current stadium lease.”  The report, which "is the first to detail how some of the Yankees money was spent,” claims the team in ’01 charged $437,500 worth of front office personnel costs to the fund.  A Yankees report filed with the Parks Department showed that 30% of President Randy Levine’s time, 20% of COO Lonn Trost’s time, 10% of General Partner Hal Steinbrenner’s time and 5% of General Partner Hank Steinbrenner’s time were charged to the fund.  In later years, subsidies continued for Trost's and Levine’s salaries. Yankees spokesperson Alice McGillion said, “The report is not worth responding to.  It is a rehash of the same failed arguments and inaccuracies.”  An official at N.Y.’s Economic Development Corp. said the report was “inaccurate” (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 7/20).