“Bridge Financing” Will Likely Keep Coyotes in Phoenix for One More Year.

Tuesday night, Glendale, Arizona’s city council voted 7-0  to fork over the $25 million the NHL requested to “cover losses” for the 2010-2011 season, as long as Glendale and the NHL don’t find an owner to purchase the Phoenix Coyotes and keep them in the desert. If they do find a new owner, there is no public financing (unless, of course, the lease on the arena is full of public financing).

Of course, being good Republicans, Glendale City Council couldn’t call it “money to cover losses,” — heaven knows there is no such thing as corporate welfare in a state were people will soon be asked “to show your citizenship papers,” — so city manager Ed Beasley was “given the authority to negotiate a fee to the NHL to maintain and operate jobing.com Arena,” if the NHL can’t find an owner before the beginning of the coming season. That, in political terms, is “bridge financing.”

If the NHL finds a new owner — either Chicago-based sports mogul Jerry Reinsdorf or the Can-Am combination known as Ice Edge Holdings — then the payments will cease. Only the NHL gets the $25 million. Nice deal.

Beasley told reporters in Phoenix last night that he expected a new owner will be found by June 30, the date the league can legally sell the Coyotes to David Thomson and Mark Chipman who would move the team to Winnipeg, likely for the 2011-2012 season.

This all sounds quite familiar. It all sounds like the crap was Winnipeg was handed in 1995. It all sounds as if the immediate future of the Coyotes is in Phoenix, but long term, this team will play somewhere else.