News item: The state of Connecticut hopes to renovate the state office building in Hartford, per a story in Monday's Hartford Courant, a restoration that would cost taxpayers $254 million.

News item: Mike Freimuth, who heads the Capital Regional Development Authority, said recently the XL Center would need a $250 million makeover, or run the risk of becoming obsolete — kaput, like the old New Haven Coliseum — in a few years.

Reactions to the news items: Verrrry interesting, as Arte Johnson used to say on "Laugh-In."

Normally, entities with such differing missions would fall under the category of McIntoshes and Valencias (apples and oranges). But the aforementioned projects share the same city of origin, same price tag and same people responsible for potentially paying.

Here's what I was taught: Taxpayer-funded projects must finish 2-for-2 during their turns at bat facing the following: Do they serve a greater good? Do they provide a return on investment?

Seems to me, myopic sports guy notwithstanding, that a reinvented XL Center serves a greater good and offers a bigger bang than a renovated state office building.

There is risk, of course, in such a proclamation. You are immediately dismissed as a dolt because you dare suggest throwing money at the toy department, versus something more practical. It's Pavlovian. Sports are nonessential, excessive and viewed disproportionately in society. And to suggest otherwise might get you accused of being — saints, preserve us — anti-intellectual.

But even the most ardent anti-sports blatherer must admit that a remodeled downtown arena that would play host to hundreds of events annually and draw hundreds of thousands of people into the city, people who buy tickets and patronize businesses, offers a better return on investment.

The state office building, while stately and ornate, is a business building. Dime a dozen. They're anywhere, everywhere. An arena is part of the city's village green. A meeting spot. Communal center.

A recent editorial in the Courant supported the $250 million to renovate the state office building because the Capitol area is fairly isolated within the city, "a campus of imposing public buildings without much to tie them together or to attract pedestrians."

Fair point. But I'd argue that the "urban fabric" for which the editorial pines, not to mention the proposed strategies that connect downtown with the rest of the city, ought to begin with the area around the XL Center first. Here's why:

Many of the XL Center's events happen in the winter: UConn men's basketball, women's basketball, hockey and the Wolfpack. Fans who attend games don't patronize local businesses enough for two reasons: it's too cold many nights to walk around for extended periods; and people, no matter how fair-minded they try to sound in public, don't feel safe.

Hence, whatever strategies the city and state propose to connect downtown with the rest of the city should focus on connecting downtown first. A skywalk that marries the XL Center to Main St., or underground walkways, popular in cold Canadian cities, should be explored. Middletown, just south of Hartford, recently built an underground walkway that connects Main St. with the riverfront. They keep people warmer and safer.

I understand that taxpayers must fund $10 million to fix the roof at Gampel Pavilion and heaven knows what else with the new Hartford ballpark. And maybe they'd give a thumbs down to both the XL Center and state office building projects. But if it's one or the other, the XL ought to win by first-round knockout.

Freimuth, to his credit, is no shyster. He knows the gravity of $250 million. But he's right when he calls the XL "the granddaddy."

"Honestly, if we keep doing what we're doing, we're going to struggle over the next three-four-five years and in my mind, that brings up the New Haven (Coliseum) question," Freimuth said recently. "It's 45 years old. It'll never have enough bathrooms or concessions. It has to be torn apart and put back together. Big nickel. You're looking at a quarter billion. That's a 'b' as in billion. At a time when the state wants to build highways and everyone else has problems that are paramount. It's hard to sell this."

Freimuth wants a modern monolith that would serve UConn well, the city well, the state well and create revenue streams. There's the return on investment idea again. And the building won't be a hurdle on the outside chance there's a sniff at professional hockey again.

It's for this reason the "new" XL Center, at some point, must be a state rallying point. Not just a Hartford thing. Whenever I address this, the inevitable "who cares" crowd from our corner of the world emerges from their caverns to bloviate. I get it. This is Connecticut. We do provincialism like Col. Sanders does extra crispy. But wouldn't it be nice if we took a swing here and – gulp – tried being supportive?

Maybe we wouldn't be on the short end of the money next time we need something.

"How do you sell this to Fairfield County and southeastern Connecticut? Tough call. We have to sell it as a state building, as a larger regional impact," Freimuth said. "We need the larger corporate business community buying in. It's nice to have Aetna, Travelers, United Healthcare and everyone else downtown buying suites.

"We need the law office in Glastonbury, the accountant in West Hartford. We need Sikorsky and Electric Boat. We need to sell it as a state flag," Freimuth said. "That's the only way we get this done. There are 80,000 UConn alums within 45 minutes of this building. Those 80,000 better be in our corner. I want to go to Fairfield. I want to go to New London. You have to get through a lot of the noise factor. It's a hard sell."

It sure is. But the larger point is that it's a better sell to taxpayers than the state office building.

Go figure.

Who knew the day would come when sports would be the more practical choice?

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro.

Twitter: @BCgenius