Courtesy of Monumental Network.

Plans to build a state-of-art Wizards practice facility have been in the works for more than a year, and controversy around them have been around for about as long. Owner Ted Leonsis confirmed on his blog last year that they were looking at sites in both D.C. and Virginia, but sought to clarify the scale:

“We do want to build a best-in-class facility, but some of those erroneous media reports suggested a 5,000-seat arena. We weren’t even thinking along those lines, and if they had conducted a little research, it would have been evident that such a facility would not have been feasible in at least one of the locations mentioned.”

Well, lo and behold, Leonsis and D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser unveiled plans last week for … a 5,000-seat arena.

The St. Elizabeths East campus is not only set to become the practice facility for the Wizards, but the new home of the Washington Mystics. With about 90 percent of the funding for the $55 million facility coming from taxpayers, the mayor touted the 118,000-square foot facility as a job creator—with priority for Ward 8 residents—and an economic boost for the surrounding area.

So people in Congress Heights are cheering that the former psychiatric hospital will bring an estimated 380,000 people annually to the neighborhood, and all the development that comes with that? Not exactly. From The Washington Post:

“In interviews with dozens of residents of this Ward 8 neighborhood, where unemployment is far higher than the national average of 5.5 percent, people were as likely to express optimism about the project’s impact on their community as they were to suggest that the city should instead be investing its money in affordable housing and better schools for their kids.”

Some residents expressed enthusiasm, like 80-year-old resident Stephen Wright, who said: “I think it’ll do wonders for our community … And it could do wonders for our wallets as well. It’ll bring employment. It’ll bring a different attitude.”

But many others worried that the shiny new facility will overshadow entrenched problems of crime, homelessness, and school quality without addressing them. “They need something that’s going to bring real jobs here, not a special-events center,” longtime resident William Riley, 42, told the Post. Added Rick Smith: “The city is constantly trying to bring more people in, but they need to focus now on how to address their homeless problem instead of building a Mystics stadium.”

Well at least the Mystics fans are happy that they’ve finally got an arena to call their own? Not exactly.

“As long-term fans, this is not okay,” Neena Chaudhry, told ThinkProgress.The move from the 20,000-seat Verizon Center to the 5,000-seat arena “shows a real lack of confidence in the Mystics and their fans.”

According to the publication, average attendance this season was 7,710, with the biggest crowd at more than 17,000. Leonsis told the Post those numbers are overinflated by sponsors who have blocks of seats that go unused, and argued that a full smaller stadium will make for a better fan experience than a largely empty Verizon Center.

But despite the fawning headlines, some sports analysts are siding with the fans. “The idea that this helps the Mystics or the WNBA in any real way is ridiculous,” David Berri, an economics professor at Southern Utah University, told ThinkProgress. “It sounds to me like they want a practice facility for the NBA team, they want the public to fund it, and they’re adding the Mystics as PR.”