Home >  Sports >  Columnists

Thursday, November 29, 2001

The Steelers are 8-2 and looking like a team that could advance well into the playoffs -- maybe to the Super Bowl. Not surprisingly, they're the talk of the town and putting a big smile on the faces of a lot of people in the region.

It would figure to be an enjoyable time in the life of Dan Rooney, the team's president. But Rooney can't fully embrace the Steelers' success. The forces of political pettiness and misguided community activism have conspired to inflame him to the point he's ready to go to court to ease his annoyance.

The source of Rooney's irritation is a decree issued earlier this month by a city government agency known as the Zoning Board of Adjustment. It ruled that Coca-Cola lettering could not be added to the Great Hall signs at Heinz Field. The Steelers had sold the naming rights to the Great Hall to Coca-Cola for 10 years at an undisclosed price.

Such deals allow Rooney to increase the Steelers' revenue, part of which would go toward improving the football team. It might be forgotten by some, but the original reason to build Heinz Field -- and PNC Park -- was to allow the Steelers and Pirates to maximize revenue to become more competitive with franchises in larger markets.

It was deals exactly like the one Rooney arranged with Coke that were supposed to put the Steelers on a more equal footing with their competitors. If Coke can't attach its name to the Great Hall, the deal will have significantly less cash value to the Steelers.

In its decision, the zoning board said the Great Hall was part of Heinz Field and that it "can be adequately identified without the phrase 'Coca-Cola.'"

Since the Great Hall has its own entrance and is open at times when Heinz Field is not, the Steelers maintain, and with a considerable degree of logic, that it is a separate facility.

When it made its ruling, the zoning board either was wearing cockeyed glasses or perhaps listening too hard to that small band of obstructionists known as the Allegheny West Civic Council. This group represents the residential neighborhood closest to Heinz Field.

Allegheny West has dug in against Rooney -- who lives in the neighborhood and is a member of the organization -- at almost every turn. Its biggest complaint is the noise coming out of the stadium. No doubt, it's noisy in the neighborhood around Heinz Field on game days. Much of the noise is emanating from the Steelers' sound system, which Allegheny West maintains could and should be improved.

Of course, much the same noise was emanating from much the same place for the previous 30 years -- long before almost all of Allegheny West's members moved into the neighborhood.

Perhaps the complainants in Allegheny West should immediately be moved to the section of Moon closest to the runways at the Pittsburgh International Airport. Then, they'd know what noise is. As it is, all they need do is visit a mall on the 10 days a year the Steelers play at home or stay inside with the windows and doors closed.

Allegheny West likes to portray living near Heinz Field as some kind of great hardship. It's nothing of the kind and, as stated, almost all the people living there knew what they were in for when they moved into the neighborhood.

But these hard-core obstructionists won't go away easily. Since they lost the battle over the noise, they're going after the Steelers on virtually every front. They challenged the Heinz Field signs, which are nothing but tasteful before going after the Coca-Cola signs.

Rooney has a hunch the zoning board ruled against him only to throw a bone to Allegheny West. At any rate, Allegheny West has leverage to use against the Steelers on the sound issue. Rooney plans to take the matter to Commonwealth Court.

If the zoning board found the Coca-Cola signs unnecessary, maybe its members should take a drive around the Heinz Field area to see what currently is hanging.

Motorists traveling north on the Fort Duquesne Bridge get a full view of huge signs for Bud Light, Giant Eagle and PNC inside PNC Park. Maybe the zoning board should have those signs removed.

If bad taste is a reason for removing a sign, the grotesquely large Carnegie Science Center lettering atop that building, which is directly across from Heinz Field, would be the first to go.

The Science Center also has posted what amount to four billboards, advertising what the facility has to offer.

But in a drive around the area yesterday, the most objectionable sign was a banner hanging from a black pole at the corner of Allegheny Avenue and Reedsdale Street. It was an advertisement for a jewelry store in Monroeville.

What does the zoning board have to say about that?

Allegheny West should shut down and the zoning board should back down. The Steelers have a right to hang Coca-Cola lettering on its Great Hall sign. Who knows? The money gained from this arrangement could bring the Steelers the free agent who'll help them win a succession of Super Bowls.

Bob Smizik can be reached at bsmizik@post-gazette.com.