We've reported numerous times on this site that, despite their insistence to the contrary, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune has been, shall we say, slightly less than neutral in their coverage of the potential new stadium for the Minnesota Vikings in Ramsey County. Ever since the announcement that the Vikings were going to partner with Ramsey County for a new stadium in Arden Hills on the site of the old Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant, the paper has seemingly done everything they can to cast the proposal in a negative light. This has occurred because they, like so many others in the Twin Cities, would seemingly rather lose the Vikings to another city than have their stadium built anywhere but downtown Minneapolis.
Of course, they ignore the fact that Minneapolis' "proposal," such as it was, would have been of a higher quality had somebody consumed a box of Scrabble tiles and defecated onto a piece of paper, but that's here nor there for our purposes.
According to an opinion piece penned by Lester Bagley, the Vikings' Vice President of Public Affairs and Stadium Development, the Star-Tribune reported a detail about the Vikings' potential plans for the Arden Hills development that is untrue. . .that the team was planning on building a convention center as part of the development, which would be in direct competition with the convention center in the Twin Cities. According to Bagley, one of the Star-Tribune's reporters had inquired about a map that was not created or distributed by the team, but by Ramsey County. The Vikings told the reporter that they have any plans to develop a convention center as part of the Arden Hills project, but the Star-Tribune ran a story two days later intimating that they were, indeed, planning on doing just that.
Now, I'm not 100% sure who's right and who's wrong on this. . .I'll leave it up to you to decide. Personally, however, based on the Star-Tribune's recent history of being anti-Arden Hills and pro-Minneapolis when it comes to a potential Vikings' stadium, I do have my leanings on this one. And I'll say the same thing I've always said. . .I, personally, don't care if this stadium is built in Arden Hills or Minneapolis or Mankato or Duluth or East Grand Forks or Thief River Falls. Just get the damn thing built already.