When the home of the Chiefs and the Royals is up for grabs, it’s probably the time to – what’s the right cliche? – swing for the fences, or throw the Hail Mary.
That’s what the Kansas Legislature has done, approving a giant package of billions in public debt to build new stadiums for those two professional sports franchises. Their current stadiums are on the Missouri side of the Kansas City metro area; the idea would be to get them to move across the line. Voters in Kansas City, Mo., shot down a tax proposal earlier this year that would have built the Royals a new stadium in downtown KC, and would have renovated Arrowhead Stadium at its current location.
A new football stadium is estimated at $2 billion. A new baseball stadium: $1.5 billion.
Officials on the Missouri side are already calling this a violation of the truce between the states to stop trying to poach businesses from each other. Which of course is true. And of course this will only prompt Missouri to respond, which could mean a bigger public giveaway to the Chiefs and/or Royals. And, for that matter, to many other businesses that will try to leverage the situation.
Whether any of that is wise public policy we won’t know for decades, but it’s easy to understand the allure. The Chiefs are at the top of the NFL, at the center of American popular culture. A new stadium could allow the KC metro area to host a Super Bowl, and so on. A new baseball stadium would draw millions of fans a year. The argument is that the economic activity generated by all that – and the spinoff – would outweigh the cost.
That gamble has worked out favorably in the case of the Kansas Speedway and the associated Legends development in KCK, but not in the case of the Prairiefire default in Overland Park. State debt financing was the key to the redevelopment of Third and Fourth streets in Manhattan, which considered as a whole has been an economic winner, even if the Flint Hills Discovery Center at the heart of it is still being subsidized by taxpayers.
It’s a gamble, and a big one. Could take 30 years to pay off the debt. And who knows? Will head-injury data mean football gets cancelled? Will baseball retreat into the dustbin of history? If not, will the Royals really ever emerge from the cellar? Will Taylor Swift write a devastating breakup song and ruin the Chiefs’ image for a generation?
Or will the money train just keep rolling as it has for decades?
Nobody knows these things, although every time I think they’ve killed the goose, it produces even more golden eggs. We’ve nearly got our own version of it locally now, what with some “college” kid getting paid $2 million to shoot baskets for five months. (Side note: I’ve decided in this space to always use the quote marks when referring to “college” athletics. You really think that kid will go to class, live in a dumpy basement on Ratone, eating Ramen and Pizza Shuttle? Pfft.)
I suppose if there’s one moment to violate a truce, put all your chips on red, swing hard, heave it to the end zone…it’s this moment. I guess.
