Back with the three candidates for at
large CC on City Council. Susan. Well, Mr.
Hill, you brought up the stadiu,
you know you serve on the Sports Authority
and something you support. Obviously.
I'd like to hear from the other.
You voted no on several things t
come to it with the stadium Andn
I don't know about you, Matthew,
but I'd like to hear your finis.
What would you tell us why
you've been negative about the
building of the baseball stadiu?
Well, largely it's been
focused on the funding of the stadium and
the development agreement and the lease,
30 year lease agreement that I d
through and felt like was a badl
for our city and for our taxpay.
I was really hoping that we coud
make some tweaks to that deal so
that we could be more excited aa
city about this public project.t
you know, just ultimately I just felt
like it was a bad deal for the .
For me, it's coming, right?
I did not have the opportunity
to vote on that, but it's comin.
And I think what we have a
responsibility to do now is to
apply pressure in as many ways s
we can to ensure that it is good
for as many people as possible.
I think back to, you know,
the World's Fair coming in and
Fyotis Robinson talked about thy
that he was able to get some blk
businesses involved in that maye
could not do major parts of it,
but were able to use that projet
way to scale up as a way to ince
their capacity going forward.
And I think that there's still
an opportunity for minority and
womenowned businesses here in tn
to get involved in the work on
the stadium and to get involved
in the retail space on the back
end to get involved in maintenae
contracts because there's going
to be money potentially there.
And if we do it that,
if we do it well and we get as y
people a place to the table as possible,
then I think we can look back on
and still feel proud about it.
We know that there are other cis
in the region that have had simr
projects that have been kind of
been a starting point to their
kind of revitalization or to
some development in those place.
And so I would love for that to
be the case here.
But I don't think we can rest in our laws.
I think we have to really prep,
apply pressure and make sure tht
as many folks as possible are gg
to get a chance to benefit frome
construction. Well, Tim,
you mentioned that you all are obviously
trying to get as much diversity
as possible with the businesses,
but talk about why you think its
a good deal for the city and frm
an economic development stand,
this is such a beneficial opportunity,
it was hard for me to imagine.
So when this thing really got l,
the first thing I did it was go
around to other cities across America
that had planted these multi use
venues in parts of their town tt
really struggled with disinvest.
I went to Oklahoma City, I went to Tulsa,
OK, I went to Greensboro,
NC, I went to Greenville,
SC and the common theme was thi,
they they ridded the blight,
they reversed the disinvestment in that area.
It it had a ring of economic
growth that was unbelievable.
And so it brings jobs,
services, housing,
it takes pressure off of the
taxpayer because every additionl
tax dollar takes pressure off
of our existing taxpayers.
So this is a fabulous opportuniy
and because of the generosity of
a citizen we have in this great city,
Randy Boyd,
he delivered the site and brought the
team and I don't know any othery
that would lay it in our laps like that.
So this is an absolutely astoung
and great opportunity for this .
So let me approach this from
a different perspective and
I'll address it to you, Tim.
You're a developer,
so you know that any project
at this scale comes with risk.
What would you say is the greatest risk
to the success of this project?e
don't have risk this this risk
is so minimal because we've we'e
kept our exposure the team owner
anything any cost overrun the tm
owner will be responsible for O.
So we we bonded $65 million.
What I didn't add was the statee
us 13 and a half million dollar.
We're going to get to keep abou0
million of sales tax revenues tt
largely would have had to have n
returned to the state so that ty
can disperse it and how they see fit.
So and then you see then you've
got a team owner that's paying
about three times the amount,
the average amount of any otherm
or he's paying $1,000,000 a yea.
Most team owners are paying
about $300,000 a year.
So would you take those revenues that
we're getting from other people's money?
It just makes great sense.
You see it differently Councilm.
Well, we've already seen, you kw
when they came before City Coun,
I believe our annual payment was
predicted to be about 240,000.
I anticipate that that is going
to be higher now based on the
cost of the project, based on
some some details of the deal. But but
in general you think that the risk there is
more risk than than what supporters have
said there is. I mean,
even looking at the development
agreement, if the team folds,
we still have to maintain
that as a sports facility,
facility which if if a Major
League Baseball says, you know,
we need to change some plans
and make some new renovations in
two years or after it's built,
that's a risk we have to put moy
forward to make that happen.
Your take Mr. Best.
Yeah, I think there's always rik
because there's also the risk of who's
going to come, who's who's you ,
folks contracted to come,
what's the turnout going to be economically.
And then there's also risk associated
with the way it affects neighbos
and affects folks in the area.
Because you know, we,
if we think about thankfully nobody's
getting displaced in terms of their homes,
but we have to think about what that how
that affects property values and other spots,
how that affects people's neighborhoods.
So there's there's a lot of risks here.
I think there's some pluses but
but to say there's no risks,
I think it's a bit of a is is a
bit of a overstatement to me.
But
you do just for the record, you favor
the project in in in. It's a lae
I am yeah. So well I'll take that back.
I it's coming right.
It's whether I favor it or not.
It is almost irrelevant at this point.
What I think we should consider,
is how do we make sure that it's
good for as many people as poss.
That's what I'm concerned with.
How because you know it's going to be very
close to where I work and where I serve
and where I do things with young people.
I think there could be a good thing for us
and that we've got access to the stadium.
We potentially get kids
jobs and things like that.
That's good for me personally,
but we have to ensure that it's
good for as many folks as possi.
Mr. Best, Mr. Hill, Miss Parker,
We've got to leave it there.
I'm sorry, we could go on for s,
but we appreciate all of you
and your kindness to come and
join us and wish wish you best
of luck on the campaign trail.
Thank you all.
We're back with our talk
around right after this.