Report Shows Cost Estimates For TN Titans’ Stadium Renovation Plans, Not City Obligations
Image Credit: Walker Kinsler / CC
The Center Square [By Jon Styf] –
A facility report commissioned by Nashville to look at the city’s obligations for a renovation of Nissan Stadium did not actually analyze those obligations.
Instead, Venue Solutions Group’s report came back as a review of the costs of the Tennessee Titans’ Dec. 2021 renovation plan along with a facility assessment, which determined that $35 million in infrastructure work is needed. That assessment included $9.8 million to replace Nissan Stadium’s end zone video boards as well as funding to upgrade audio and security systems.
VSG’s analysis was used by Mayor John Cooper when he announced the mayor’s office’s $2.1 billion new stadium funding deal, which will include at least $1.26 billion in public funding up front and public funding for future improvements at the stadium with a Titans backstop.
“As you know, the current lease for the Titans’ stadium imposes an obligation to provide facility improvements and to maintain the team’s stadium in ‘first class condition’ – an obligation currently borne by Nashville taxpayers,” Cooper said in a letter to Nashville’s council and sports authority. “Under current estimates, that obligation will impose costs ranging between $1.75 billion and $1.95 billion over the remaining 17 years of the current stadium lease.”
The VSG report was released Tuesday heading into a city council meeting on Tuesday night where a term sheet between the mayor’s office and Titans on the new stadium deal is expected to be discussed. VSG is expected to present its findings at the Nov. 7 meeting of the East Bank Stadium Committee.
In discussing the Titans’ term sheet in a post analyzing the deal, committee chair Bob Mendes said that the mayor’s office is pushing a deal with too many unknowns, including the unknown of ongoing maintenance/upgrade costs at a new stadium as well as unknown costs for construction of a city-owned Stadium Village.
He pointed out the new stadium deal, which includes a $500 million lump sum payment from Tennessee as well as future sales taxes at the stadium and surrounding development, puts added costs on the state.
“I’m paraphrasing, but the argument coming from the Mayor’s Office is basically ‘let’s take the money and run — you should vote to approve the stadium project quickly before they change their minds.'” Mendes wrote. “Maybe we should do just that.”
Mendes later points out that, “(By the way, since we all pay state taxes, the state share is not “free” to Nashvillians…we are paying that too!).”
About the Author: Jon Styf, The Center Square Staff Reporter – Jon Styf is an award-winning editor and reporter who has worked in Illinois, Texas, Wisconsin, Florida and Michigan in local newsrooms over the past 20 years, working for Shaw Media, Hearst and several other companies. Follow Jon on Twitter @JonStyf.
These people are so out of touch with the real world. Any costs related to this fiasco will ultimately fall on the heads of all Tn. taxpayers. My personal opinion is that, if the Titans want a new stadium, they should pay for it. The game has gotten so expensive the average Joe is out of it. If they threaten to leave, buy them bus tickets, it will be far cheaper in the long run.