A meeting has been set for Monday at which key players in
the public buyout of the Target Center hope to complete the deal.
The Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission (MSFC),
Timberwolves Owner Glen Taylor, and Ogden Corp, who manages the
facility, had hoped to finalize the deal by the end of the year
in order to stabilize the financing. However, both MSFC
Executive Director Bill Lester and Minneapolis finance officer
John Moir said a deal will be impossible to achieve before 1995.
Rising interest rates have adversely affected the transaction
because Taylor and the MSFC have used short-term variable-rate
interest debt to finance the agreement. Ogden, who dropped out
of the deal once before, sent company officials to New York
Thursday to meet with NBA officials and appraise them of the
progress. Ogden is "concerned" about the risks of short-term,
variable-rate financing, with rising interest rates fueling this
concern. If the Target Center buyout is not completed by
January, it will move into its third year (Jay Weiner,
Minneapolis STAR-TRIBUNE, 12/15).
