The City of Knoxville levied its amusement tax on tickets to UT athletics events and other tickets issued by the institution in 1951, and UT paid $18,200. In 1952 Tennessee Attorney General Roy Beeler issued a ruling that UT would be exempt from the amusement tax, including tickets sold for athletics events.
In 1982, as part of the funding plan for Thompson-Boling Arena, county commission voted to adopt a private act passed for it by the general assembly to increase the county amusement tax and apply it to UT football and basketball tickets. In 1983 the City of Knoxville announced that events on the UT campus that were scheduled primarily for entertainment and that produced profits for a producer or promoter would be subject to the city’s amusement tax. The announcement represented a compromise between the city law department and UT Vice Chancellor Howard Aldmon. The city had complained that the Civic Auditorium and Coliseum was losing big-name acts and revenue because the amusement tax did not apply to events held on the UT campus.
The compromise agreement applied the amusement tax to all events that had an admission charge and that were held in Neyland Stadium, Stokely Athletics Center, or Thompson-Boling Arena. The cultural, artistic, and educational programs of the university were not made subject to the tax as long as proceeds went exclusively to the benefit of the university and its programs, and not to the benefit of any promoter or producer of the activity (except the university itself).