Kansas And Missouri could be in a bidding war for Kansas City’s two teams.
The process of attempting to get the owner of the National Football League’s Kansas City Chiefs franchise, Clark Hunt, and the owner of Major League Baseball’s Kansas City Royals franchise, John Sherman, to move operations from Jackson County, Missouri to a spot near Kansas City, Kansas has started. Kansas lawmakers are mulling over a proposal that would see STAR bonds used to help pay 75 percent of the cost of building two stadiums in Kansas. Additionally, sports gambling and lottery gaming and sales tax revenue from businesses in the stadium development districts would cover bond debt. Another source of revenue to pay off the debt would come from a liquor tax. Kansas lawmakers could use a mechanism that would allow up to 100 percent of sales tax revenue on alcoholic liquor sales within a stadium district to pay off bonds for the structures. That is the initial plan for the construction of the two stadiums in Kansas but there is a long way to go before shovels are put in the ground and Kansas starts building stadiums.
Missouri lawmakers will undoubtedly come up with a plan for Hunt and Sherman to review. Missouri Governor Mike Parson has said Missouri would develop a “competitive” stadium offer. On April 2nd, Jackson County, Missouri voters said no to continuing a stadium sales tax with the revenue going into a stadium building bank account. Had Jackson County voters said yes to extending the sales tax, Sherman would have been able to build a downtown Kansas City ballpark and Hunt would have had the money to renovate his present football venue. Hunt and Sherman are now in a good spot, two states are ready to throw money at them to build stadiums for their businesses. It is a place that sports owners dream about.
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Evan can be reached at evan_weiner@hotmail.com
