A 170-year-old conflict is being reignited as Kansas lawmakers try to seize power. Super Bowl Champions The Kansas City Chiefs pulled out of Missouri, even though economists long ago concluded that subsidizing professional sports was the way to go. Not worth the cost.
Top Kansas legislative leaders have backed support for the Chiefs and professional baseball’s Kansas City Royals. Fund a new stadium The bill was passed by Kansas ahead of a special legislative session scheduled to convene on Tuesday. The plan would issue state bonds to build the stadium and pay it off with revenue from sports betting, the Kansas Lottery and additional taxes around the new stadium.
The state border runs through a metropolitan area of about 2.3 million people, meaning the team will only travel about 25 miles (40 kilometers) west.
Decades of research have concluded that professional sports franchises provide little to no boost to local economies, mostly because they capture existing spending from elsewhere in the same community. But for Kansas officials, the ability to outbid Missouri, at least with spending leaving Missouri and coming to Kansas, has its own appeal.
“I’ve always wanted to see the Chiefs come to Kansas, but I hope we can do it in a way that enriches the community rather than putting an additional burden on them,” said Rep. Jason Probst, a Democrat from central Kansas.
The rivalry between Kansas and Missouri dates back to the Civil War, before Kansas became a state. Missourians came from the East. A vain hope of creating a new slave state Both sides committed robbery, arson and murder across the border.
There’s a century-old sports rivalry between the University of Kansas and the University of Missouri, and both states have spent hundreds of millions of dollars over the years trying to attract businesses seeking jobs on either side of the border. An uneasy truce 2019.
Missouri officials have vowed to work equally aggressively to keep both Royals and Chiefs, and not just because they view them as economic assets.
“They’re a source of great pride,” said Missouri state Rep. John Patterson, a Republican from suburban Kansas City who is expected to become the next state House speaker.
Kansas lawmakers tour Chiefs and Royals In the play Missouri voters Rejected in April It would extend local sales taxes to help pay for the upkeep of the two teams’ adjacent stadiums. Lawmakers also argue that without action, there’s a risk that one or both teams will leave the Kansas City area, though economists are skeptical that that threat is real.
Kansas officials say the team must decide quickly to have a new or renovated stadium ready by January 2031, even though the lease for the stadium complex runs through that year. They also promised the Chiefs a stadium with a dome or retractable roof that could host the Super Bowl, college basketball Final Four and large indoor concerts.
“You have this asset and all the businesses that will be relocating there or being created there as a result of that,” said Kansas Rep. Shawn Tarwater, a Republican from the edge of suburban Kansas City, Kan., and a leader in the relocation effort. “There’s going to be commercial activity coming out of this area every day.”
Approximately 60% of the region’s population lives in Missouri, but the Kansas side is growing faster.
Despite the legislative push in Kansas, Missouri lawmakers are in no rush to propose an alternative. Republican Gov. Mike Parson told reporters on Thursday that the state “is not just going to give in,” but added that “we’re still in the first quarter of the campaign.”
Both states hold primaries on Aug. 3, with most of the seats on the ballot this year. Missouri’s April stadium tax vote suggested that subsidizing professional sports teams could be a political defeat in the state, especially with conservative voters in the Republican primary.
“In Missouri, the Republican Party used to be led by business people who were in favor of these things, but that’s not the case in the Trump era,” said David Kimball, a political science professor at the University of Missouri in St. Louis. “They’re not as much in favor of spending taxpayer money on anything as conservatives, as Trump supporters.”
Kansas Republicans are under pressure from the right to avoid the state picking economic winners and losers. For Probst, a Democrat, the concern is using government to “make the rich richer,” meaning team owners.
Economists have studied subsidies for professional sports teams and stadiums since at least the 1980s, and their findings have found that subsidizing stadiums is “the worst possible vehicle for economic growth,” said J.C. Bradbury, a professor of economics and finance at Kennesaw State University in Georgia.
Supporters of the Kansas effort cite reports showing large positive economic impacts, but Bradbury said “fake” reports are a staple of stadium campaigns.
“The consensus is pretty much that stadiums are a bad public investment,” said Bradbury, who conducted the study.
But more than 30 lobbyists have registered to push a stadium financing plan to Kansas state lawmakers, and the CEO of the Kansas Chamber of Commerce has called it a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” to attract the Chiefs.
Not only have the Chiefs won three Super Bowl championships in five years, but their fan base has grown especially thanks to the performance of tight end Travis Kelce. Romance Pop star and Taylor Swift.
Judith Grant Long, an associate professor of sport management and urban planning at the University of Michigan and director of the school’s Center for Sports Venues, said host cities find the NFL attractive because its franchises are worth billions of dollars and their wealthy owners and famous players draw media attention.
“All of this combines to create a powerful combination for politicians, local government officials and local businesses who want to use their influence,” she said.
