Arena odds just got longer

A little twinge of anxiety always hits the community when the new neighbors move in.

What do they do for a living? What kind of music do they listen to? Are they sociable or are they loners? Are they loud? Do they park the chassis of their beaten-up cars on blocks on the front lawn?

And do they contribute money to anti-gay groups?

Seattle, we have a problem.

Seems a couple of the Sonics' new hefty financial backers, Aubrey McClendon and Tom Ward, have been willing to spend backup point guard money to support former Republican presidential candidate Gary Bauer's "Americans United to Preserve Marriage."

In other words, these two new members of the NBA family, the same family that banished former point guard Tim Hardaway from this month's All-Star bash after he admitted hating gays, are threatened by the idea of same-sex marriage.

The pair donated a combined $1.1 million in the years 2004 and 2005 to the organization that is committed to keeping marriage a heterosexual thing.

Yikes.

First let me say that Oklahomans McClendon and Ward have every right to donate money to any cause they like. They could throw Rashard Lewis-type money at "Clowns Against Four-Way Traffic Stops" and it would be no concern of mine.

They have every right to their wrong-headed beliefs that the sanctity of marriage would be threatened every time a gay couple tied the knot.

It's a free country.

If McClendon and Ward wanted to march on the Seattle Center proclaiming that the Space Needle presented a danger to the pedestrians who walked under it, I would be there to support their right, if not their cause.

But I don't think I'd want them as neighbors.

Of course, their lives have changed since they made these donations. When they were writing checks to Americans United to Preserve Marriage, it probably seemed unlikely to them that, some two years later, they would be asking the state of Washington for $300-plus million to build a pleasure palace in Renton.

I doubt they even knew where or what Renton was.

But here we are in 2007, and when it comes to basketball, they aren't in Oklahoma any more. And political beliefs that might fly in Oklahoma City can crash and burn in Seattle.

For all of his many blunders as the Sonics' owner, Howard Schultz's political beliefs were much more reflective of this neighborhood than his successors'.

Now, it doesn't matter that I think Americans United to Preserve Marriage, whose motto is, "Marriage: One Man and One Woman," is an organization that should mind its own business and concentrate on the real problems in the country and the world.

What matters is, McClendon and Ward are bringing this heavy baggage to an area where many don't lean that way politically. They are trying to gain favor with the same state legislators who are expected to approve benefits for domestic partnerships.

What also matters is that I don't think either McClendon or Ward cares even a smidgen for the WNBA.

My guess is that if the team moved out of town, the Storm, which has a significant amount of lesbian support, would fold quicker than a picnic table in a thunderstorm.

Imagine the righteous indignation the WNBA-going members of Americans United to Preserve Marriage would feel if they saw women in the stands holding hands.

And I can't imagine any WNBA player, straight or gay, wanting to play for an ownership that has spent that much money fighting gay marriage.

The leaking of this news, first reported by PoliticalMoneyLine, came on the same day Sonics and Storm owner Clay Bennett stood side-by-side with the legendary Bill Russell in Olympia, as Bennett testified in front of an enthusiastic crowd of fans and a skeptical House Finance Committee for his new arena.

This news comes on the same day the Sonics released a sketch of their new digs, a drawing, I believe, Bennett hoped would be cause for celebration.

The sorrow over the death of former Sonics guard Dennis Johnson and the nostalgia over the retirement of former All-Star Spencer Haywood's No. 24 jersey Monday night, once again, shows the value and connection the Sonics have had to this community.

But the neighborhood is changing. Heck, at the very least it's moving to Renton. And the news about the philanthropic bent of Bennett's colleagues just made his sales pitch in Olympia a little more difficult.

Steve Kelley: 206-464-2176 or skelley@seattletimes.com