Before the Pinellas County Commission punted on finalizing bonds for a new $1. 3 billion stadium again on Tuesday, the Tampa Bay Rays wrote a letter saying the deal approved this summer no longer works financially for the team. The St.
Petersburg City Council will hold a vote Thursday on whether to finance its own portion of the stadium as well as the costs of roads and sewers in the surrounding redevelopment. But if there is no stadium deal, what does that mean for the Historic Gas Plant District redevelopment plan around it, a top priority for St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch?
What happens to plans to build a Black history museum, 5,000 condos including affordable housing, hotels, office and medical space, a grocery store and a day care? And do the Rays and their development partner Hines get to keep the land under it? If the current deal is truly dead, does that mean the Rays’ profit from that land could fund a new ballpark elsewhere?
The county is not a party in the agreement approved in July by the St. Petersburg City Council governing the redevelopment of the 65 acres of prime, public land around the stadium by the Rays and Hines. The city has agreed to sell the land for a significantly discounted price of $105 million.
But commissioners wanted to know how their votes would affect that part of the project. If the county backs out of the stadium pact, is that the death knell to the Gas Plant? It’s complicated, and it depends, said Assistant County Attorney Donald Crowell on Tuesday.
He said there is no condition in the redevelopment agreement that requires the county’s bonds, so that would not kill the Historic Gas Plant plan. City Administrator Rob Gerdes, who was present at the meeting, put it this way: “The best way to protect the land from Mr. Sternberg profiting off the land and also moving the team is if the deal does not go forward and the Rays are the ones who back out.
”“If the Rays back out, then we have a lot of protections on the Gas Plant side,” he continued. “If the city or county doesn’t go forward, it becomes a lot more complicated. ”In his first day as a commissioner, Vince Nowicki asked if the Rays have reached out to the city to say that they would nix that part of the deal and give the land back since they’ve stopped all work on the project.
Gerdes said the city has not had that discussion with the team. “I think by my earlier comments, you could probably tell that we do have a concern about the team leaving and the redevelopment remaining in their hands, and that’s something that we’re going to have to work through,” Gerdes said. Commissioners left Tuesday’s meeting saying they were unclear what that meant for the Gas Plant District and who would own the development rights on the land if a stadium is not built.
At a workshop on the deal in May, City Council member Lisset Hanewicz, the sole attorney on that board, asked about a “funding offset right” in the contract. Gerdes explained that since the city can’t obligate future city councils to approve paying for infrastructure in phases, the developer would be entitled to a credit of 107. 5% of those costs against the purchase of the land.
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Let’s get started. Explore all your optionsHanewicz expressed concern that the legal terms of the agreement leave the city unprotected. “We don’t want to incentivize future city councils not to issue the bonds and just do the land transfer,” Gerdes said.
Redeveloping the area around Tropicana Field in a way that benefits the Black community has been a central priority for Welch, the city’s first Black mayor. The deal includes a $50 million commitment from the Rays and Hines toward affordable and workforce housing, small-business assistance, diverse hiring, job creation and educational programs, plus $10 million for the Woodson African American Museum of Florida. About 11,000 permanent full- and part-time jobs are expected to be created.
The land was once home to Black-owned businesses and neighborhoods collectively known as the Gas Plant District but was bulldozed decades ago in the name of cleaning up blight. It was later used to build a stadium to lure professional baseball to St. Petersburg and serve as an economic boost.
Baseball eventually came, though promised jobs and opportunities didn’t. The Rays, under current ownership, have spent 17 years making the pitch for a new home more central to the region’s population before agreeing to stay in St. Petersburg with taxpayer help to pay for another stadium.
A deal was reached in July. But then the roof was torn off Tropicana Field during Hurricane Milton and elections ushered in two stadium skeptics on the County Commission, which voted 6-1 on Tuesday to postpone a vote on its share of the financing until December. The Rays have said delays are driving up the costs for the stadium.
They’re obligated to pay for overruns. The Tampa Bay Times reached out to St. Petersburg to ask about the implications for the Gas Plant District redevelopment.
Neither of two spokespersons for the city acknowledged requests for an interview or comment via two text messages, two emails and phone calls. A spokesperson for the Rays declined to comment. This post was originally published on this site be sure to check out more of their content.
