The team's ownership, and future location, rest on whether a bankruptcy judge agreed in court August 5.
Now, Kaites and Reinsdorf might actually be the solution to Glendale's hockey woes. They might be its nightmare. We just don't know: Bid details have been sealed.
Liam Foley/Icon SMI
This hockey fight is now in a courtroom.
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When the Goldwater Institute asked Glendale for information about what incentives the city was offering to keep the team under the Kaites/Reinsdorf plan, the institute was flatly denied access. It sued. Even though Superior Court Judge Edward Burke has ruled that some information should be released — and quickly — the bids and information about the incentives was deemed confidential.
But secrets have a way of being revealed, and it's clear to me from city records that no other prospective buyers enjoyed as much access to City Hall as John Kaites and his cohorts. I surveyed a full year of Ed Beasley's daily planner, and no one came to close to Kaites in lunches and scheduled telephone calls. Kaites' omnipresence can't help but have affected Beasley's attitude toward the team's current ownership.
According to an affidavit signed by Jeff Shumway, the team's CEO during the period of time when Kaites and Reinsdorf were meeting with Beacon, Shumway attempted repeatedly to get Beasley to tell his city council about the team's problems.
Instead, Shumway writes, Beasley seemed mostly interested in bringing in a new owner.
"Mr. Beasley reiterated to me that Glendale would not provide [current ownership of the team] concessions because Glendale was only interested in renegotiating when a new entity purchased the Phoenix Coyotes hockey team," the affidavit says. "I explained to him that there was no way Coyotes Hockey . . . would be willing to survive without concessions and that even with the concessions he was willing to make, a new owner would likely need additional concessions . . .
"Mr. Beasley made it plain to me that Glendale was not interested in making financial concessions to Coyotes Hockey . . . while Mr. Moyes was owner of the team."
But Beasley appparently has been willing to make those same concessions for his hand-selected bidders, Kaites and Reinsdorf. The city manager did what he could to put the prospective owners in position — hiring Reinsdorf's son's firm, bringing in Beacon as a "neutral" analyst, sitting back as Beacon met with Reinsdorf and Kaites.
Finally, the Arizona Republic reported Friday that part of the deal for Reinsdorf and Kaites could involve as much as $23 million annually in incentives, through a special voluntary tax on businesses near Jobing.com Arena. And, if the team continues to lose money, Glendale could have to give the Coyotes' owners another $15 million a year.
Even Cardinals president Michael Bidwill is crying foul on this one.
Glendale wasn't even willing to talk about concessions with Moyes, but it seems ready to hand over the keys to the bank vault to Reinsdorf and Kaites.
See what I mean by "rotten"?
John Kaites has a backstory common to many lobbyists. He's a lawyer and a former politician. Before that, though, he was a weatherman for the local NBC affiliate, Channel 12.
A short man with TV-ready hair, Kaites worked as an assistant attorney general, then a deputy county attorney, and finally served three terms as a state legislator before running (unsuccessfully) for AG in 1998.
These days, Kaites practices law at a firm called Ridenour Hienton & Lewis. He also runs a lobbying firm in central Phoenix, Public Policy Partners, and has formed a "consulting" business with the former president of the powerful Phoenix firefighters union, Billy Shields. Perhaps not so coincidentally, Kaites now lobbies for a host of ambulance companies, the public safety personnel retirement system, and the union itself.
Kaites' star crossed with Chicago Bulls and Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf while Kaites was still in politics.
Author Charles Fountain described their meeting this way in a book called Under the March Sun: The Story of Spring Training.
"Long an admirer of the White Sox owner, Kaites asked if he could buy Reinsdorf dinner and pick his brain," Fountain writes. "'I'm buying him dinner,' said Kaites, seemingly struck more by the audacity of his having asked than the irony of the young politician picking up the millionaire's dinner check."
In no time, Reinsdorf became a big backer of Kaites' political career, loaning the politician $28,000 for the attorney general's race. And, according to author Fountain, Kaites played a small role in helping move the White Sox's spring training operation to Tucson in 1998.
Just a few years later, Reinsdorf wanted to move the team's spring training to the Valley, and Kaites was out of office and ready to lobby. He eventually helped Reinsdorf get his deal in Glendale — with nearly two-thirds of the financing coming from the Arizona Sports and Tourism Authority.
How did Kaites get such a sweet deal for Reinsdorf, especially on an intrastate deal like the Sox move? It surely didn't hurt that Kaites knew the ins and outs of Arizona politics, including all about the pot of gold the Sports and Tourism Authority had been sitting on. And as a former legislator representing Glendale, and a lobbyist in partnership with the powerful firefighters union, which can be a singularly important force in municipal politics, Kaites surely had no problem getting anyone in Glendale to return his calls.
