The Enquirer
 |  Cincinnati Enquirer

Tom Gabelman is not bitter.

But when he learned Hamilton County was firing him and his former law firm, Frost Brown Todd, as outside counsel handling riverfront development and negotiations with the Bengals for a new stadium lease, he was stunned.

“Within the last year and a half, we probably have had 12 executive sessions, and that’s how we meet with the (Hamilton County Board of Commissioners) to advise them,” Gabelman said on this week’s episode of The Enquirer’s That’s So Cincinnati podcast. “And in none of those executive sessions did we ever hear, oh, well, I don’t think you’re going in the right direction, or there’s some issue with performance.

“We’ve been counsel for almost 30 years, and we’ve demonstrated our record.”

Gabelman reflected on those three decades working to secure property transfers, political deals and lease modifications – which he said benefitted the county – after voters in 1996 approved the half-cent sales tax increase that funded Paycor Stadium (formerly Paul Brown Stadium) and Great American Ball Park. He was on the front lines in 1998 when the late Todd Portune, then a Cincinnati City Council member, literally turned back the hands of time to meet a property transfer deadline.

“We’re going into this midnight deadline … and we were running behind. So (Portune) moved the clock,” Gabelman said. Gabelman left city hall in the wee hours that morning with the deed in hand.

Gabelman did not hold back when rebutting critics who suggested he and his firm were profiting at the expense of taxpayers without bringing value, pointing to millions of dollars acquired in grants, tax savings and investments on the riverfront.

“Gabelman’s charging them a million dollars a year. Well, yeah, at a severely discounted rate that is probably a negative margin with my own firm,” Gabelman said. “But we put public good over profit because we saw the change that had been happening and the change that continues to happen.”

Despite the turn of events, Gabelman said the announcement of a new lease agreement is imminent.

“I am very optimistic,” he said. “I think we left the county well positioned to get the deal done with the Bengals. They should get the deal done with the Bengals because we had 90 percent of it done.”

That’s So Cincinnati, The Enquirer’s weekly podcast on what’s making news in our community, features a who’s who of special guests. Listen to it at Audioboom, Apple or your favorite podcast platform.