But they will save millions of dollars in taxes if they get their way in Congress.
The Sullivans and hundreds of other individuals and more than 250 businesses would escape payment of federal income taxes thanks to custom- tailored provisions spliced into the Miscellaneous Revenue Act of 1988, now pending in Congress.
As with every tax bill, the pending one would create some winners and some losers. As might be expected, the Sullivans and other beneficiaries are hoping that lawmakers approve their tax breaks before leaving Washington next month to wage re-election campaigns.
On the other hand, a tiny group of affluent investors in a Colorado-based mining partnership is hoping that Congress does nothing. If Congress fails to act, this group will continue to benefit from a tax break that it was not supposed to have in the first place.
That may sound a bit contradictory. But so, too, is the manner in which the House Ways and Means Committee and Senate Finance Committee go about writing the tax laws.
First, the dark side of the Sullivan family's finances.
Stadium Management Corp., which owns the 61,000-seat Sullivan Stadium in Foxboro, Mass., outside Boston, where the Patriots play their games, is controlled by son Charles.
From 1984 to 1987, according to records filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Boston, Stadium Management Corp. and its wholly owned subsidiaries ran up $22.8 million in losses.
Those same records show the company has debts of around $55 million and assets of about half that amount. The company currently is operating under the protection of the bankruptcy code.
Among the company's money-losing sidelines: Charles Sullivan's brief - and extraordinarily costly - fling as a rock music promoter in 1984, when he lost millions of dollars staging the multi-city Victory Tour by Michael Jackson and his family.
