ST. PETERSBURG, Florida — An important vote in the city council on Thursday on an important redevelopment project in St. Petersburg could clear the way for a new stadium for the Tampa Bay Rays, a baseball team that will stay there for at least 30 years.
The $6.5 billion project, proponents say, would transform an 86-acre (34-hectare) area of downtown, with plans in the coming years for a black history museum, affordable housing, a hotel, green space, entertainment venues, and office and retail space. There’s also the promise of thousands of jobs.
The site, now home to the Rays’ domed Tropicana Field and sprawling parking lots, was once a thriving black community that was displaced by the construction of the baseball stadium and an interstate highway. A priority for St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch is to right some of those wrongs in what’s known as the Historic Gas Plant District.
“The city has never done anything this big,” said Welch, the city’s first black mayor with family ties to the old neighborhood. “It’s a momentous day for our city and county.”
The pivot of the project is the planned $1.3 billion ballpark with 30,000 seats, scheduled to open for the 2028 season. That would end years of uncertainty about the Rays’ future, including possible moves to Tampa, or to Nashville, Tenn., or even splitting home games between St. Petersburg and Montreal, an idea MLB rejected.
Stu Sternberg, the Rays’ principal owner, said approval of the project — which also requires a vote by the Pinellas County Commission — will resolve the issue of the team’s future location.
“We want to be here. We want to be here to stay,” Sternberg said Wednesday.
The Rays typically have one of the lowest attendance records in MLB, despite the team having made the playoffs five years in a row. This year, going into this week’s All-Star break, the Rays are 48-48, which puts them in fourth place in the American League East division.
The financing plan calls for the city to spend about $417.5 million, including $287.5 million for the stadium itself and $130 million in infrastructure for the larger redevelopment project that would include things like sewers, traffic lights and roads. The city does not anticipate any new or increased taxes.
Pinellas County, meanwhile, would spend about $312.5 million on its share of the ballpark’s costs. Officials say the county’s money would come from a bed tax that is largely funded by visitors and can only be spent on tourism and economic development expenses. The County Commission is expected to vote on the plan July 30.
The remainder of the project would be financed primarily by the Rays and Houston-based development company Hines.
The baseball field plan is part of a wave of construction or renovation projects at sports venues across the country, including the Milwaukee Brewers, Buffalo Bills, Tennessee Titans and the Oakland Athletics, who plan to relocate to Las Vegas. Like the Rays’ proposal, all of the projects come with millions of dollars in public funding that are often met with opposition.
While the city’s business and political leaders largely support the deal, there are opponents. Councilman Richie Floyd said there are many other ways the stadium money could be spent to meet community needs.
“It’s still one of the largest stadium subsidies in MLB history. That’s the core of my concern,” Floyd said.
A citizens group called “No Home Run” and other organizations oppose the deal, while the conservative/libertarian Americans for Prosperity argues that the track record of other publicly funded sports stadiums is less than encouraging.
“The economic benefits promised by proponents of publicly funded sports stadiums have repeatedly failed to materialize,” said Skylar Zander, the group’s state director. “Studies have consistently shown that the return on investment for such projects is questionable at best, with most of the economic gain flowing to private interests rather than the general public.”
Still, the project appears to have momentum on its side. For former residents and descendants of the Gas Plant District neighborhood, it can’t come soon enough.
“All across this country, our history is being erased. That will not happen here,” said Gwendolyn Reese, president of the African American Heritage Association of St. Petersburg. “Our voices will be heard. And not just heard, but valued.”