“I’ve been waiting for Clay Bennett to flip us all off and tell us to go jump in the lake,” Prentice said.

My thoughts… “Really Senator? Is this what we should expect from Clay Bennett?”

I do not share Senator Margarita Prentice’s view that it is reasonable, even figuratively, for Clay Bennett to flip off the State of Washington. Okay… so the House and Senate would not put a hurried and incomplete Sonics arena proposal ahead of schools, mental health, justice, and other state priorities in the last legislative session…does that make it acceptable or effective to flip them off?

I know arenas are really cool, and it would have been great for Renton to get an influx of three-hundred million dollars of state money pumped into our community. But even so, Renton citizens are simply not the sore-losers that Senator Prentice’s language suggests.

Instead of flipping off the state legislature, it would be more appropriate for Clay Bennett, if he is serious about a new Seattle-area Sonics arena, to hold meetings with key members of the House and Senate to see what these elected officials would need in a revised proposal. He could also make good use of the months prior to the next legilative session communicating with other cities and potential private-sector sponsors. It’s not like the team is getting evicted or anything…they have several years left on their Key Arena lease. Clay Bennett could even patch things up with the city of Seattle if he put his mind to it. The Sonics and Storm fans, who have supported basketball for decades, deserve a good faith effort in this department…not more school-yard talk.

If Margarita Prentice is right, and Clay Bennett now refuses to initiate productive diologue with Washington’s elected officials, then I will positively conclude that it was never Mr. Bennett’s intention to keep the team in the region; and it would follow that Renton was snookered out of the tens of thousands of dollars we spent evaluating the areana proposal.

I’m proud of the fact that Renton has a desirable piece of property, large enough for an NBA arena and convention center, with the proper zoning in place. This says a lot about our city’s opportunity. But we don’t have tens of millions of public dollars to help pay for a regional sports facility, nor can we afford to start alienating the state house and senate with talk about extended middle fingers.

Here is an excerpt from today’s Seattle Time Story:

The state Legislature rejected Bennett’s proposal for a $500 million Renton arena this spring.

State Sen. Margarita Prentice, D-Renton, a vocal supporter of that effort, said lawmakers treated team owners “shabbily” by refusing to seriously consider the Renton plan. Some lawmakers also have criticized McClendon and another Sonics partner, Tom Ward, for making large contributions to an anti-gay-marriage group.

Prentice said she doesn’t blame McClendon for his latest comments.

“I’ve been waiting for Clay Bennett to flip us all off and tell us to go jump in the lake,” Prentice said.

And you can read the complete story here