TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A plan in Kansas for luring the Kansas City’s two major league sports franchises from Missouri has prompted their hometown’s mayor to declare that the move ends a 5-year-old agreement by the states not to poach each other’s jobs.
The Kansas Legislature has approved a measure to allow the state to issue bonds to help the Super Bowl Champion Chiefs and Major League Baseball’s Royals pay for new stadiums in Kansas. It goes next to Gov. Laura Kelly.
Here are a few things to know about the two states’ contest for the teams.
Kansas is poised to make offers
While Kelly has not formally pledged to sign the stadium-financing bill, she issued a positive statement when it passed Tuesday, saying it could make Kansas “a professional sports powerhouse.” If she signs it, as many lawmakers expect, it would take effect July 1.
The state’s secretary of commerce, Lt. Gov. David Toland, would negotiate with one or both teams on a plan for a new stadium. Kelly and eight top legislative leaders would have to approve each deal with a vote in a public meeting.
A deal would draw the boundaries of a district around a stadium and possibly another around a separate practice facility, and new state sales and alcohol tax revenues generated by shops, restaurants, bars and hotels within that district would pay off the bonds over 30 years.
The city and county could pledge tax revenues as well but are not required to do so, and the state also could use revenues from sports betting and state lottery ticket sales to back bonds as well.
The bonds could cover up to 70% of the costs of the new stadiums, though supporters of the plan don’t expect that, anticipating that two stadiums together could cost $4 billion.
There is talk of a renewed economic ‘border war’
The Kansas-Missouri border splits the 2.3 million-resident Kansas City area, and there’s both Kansas City, Missouri, and Kansas City, Kansas. Much of the border is the median of State Line Road, and about 60% of the area’s residents live on the Missouri side.
A feud between the two states has existed for generations and most recently saw each state burning through tens of millions of dollars in subsides to pull existing businesses across the border. Officials on both sides came to see the contest as expensive and wasteful, and in 2019, Kelly, a Democrat, and Missouri Gov. Mike Parson, a Republican, signed a truce.
Kansas City, Missouri Mayor Quinton Lucas told reporters that Kansas’ bid for the Chiefs and Royals restarted that economic “border war.”
“I do believe long-term that we’re one place and it’s better when we work together,” he said during a news conference.
But Kelly doesn’t agree that the states’ truce has been violated, telling reporters this week that before the agreement, “We never discussed the teams.”
