It’s been debated in plenty of places whether new stadiums actually are a boon for the surrounding communities or not. Do they help the people and small businesses that feed off the team and the stadium or do they really just enrich the already rich? The Village Voice seems to come down more than a little hard on the Yankees, seemingly blaming them for the serious poverty and hunger problems that exist in the district that also houses the 2009 World Series Champs:

Here’s new evidence of what the new Yankee Stadium has brought to The Bronx. Not only is the borough home to one of the poorest congressional districts in America — the home of the new, heavily-subsidized stadium and the current World Champs can also boast that their ‘hood is also the hungriest Congressional district in the nation!

As of the last census, in 2000, the 16th Congressional District was the poorest in the nation, with 42.2 percent of residents living below the poverty line. Now, nearly a decade later, a new Gallup poll finds that more than 36 percent of people in the 16th have reported that there are times when they have not had money to buy food for themselves or their family.

This compares to a hunger rate of “just” 16.5 percent in the greater New York/New Jersey/Long Island area.

C’mon…if anyone could realistically think, imagine, envision a new stadium turning around one of the poorest areas in the nation within a year of its opening, you’re fooling yourself. Yankee Stadium has been at essentially the same location for 80 odd years. That area of the Bronx didn’t suddenly become impoverished and if the “old” stadium wasn’t helpful, why would we think that the “new” one would change it overnight?

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