The Washington Nationals‘ stadium won’t even turn 19 years old until next spring, but the D.C. city council already approved spending tax money two years ago for renovations, including such important upgrades as “wrapping the exterior of the parking in a more visually appealing material.” And we’re now finding out how much it will cost Washingtonians to have prettier parking garages, and that figure is $410 million:
D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s bill to fund the renovations was formally filed Thursday. It would authorize the issuance of up to $410 million in bonds — but not any more than is needed to generate $380 million in net proceeds….
It is unclear how much the Nationals would contribute to the renovation.
Sports Business Journal doesn’t have much more in the way of details on what all this will pay for, though it does mention making “the concourses of the stadium feel wider” and upgrading player areas because “all teams rely on happy players,” according to deputy mayor for planning and economic development Nina Albert.
As discussed back in 2024 when the price tag was only “at least $200 million,” this is money coming from the same taxes that paid for building the stadium in the first place, which would soon have started flowing into D.C.’s general fund if not for legislation two years ago that instead diverted it to a Ballpark Preservation and Improvement Fund. That fund is expected to have $380 million in it by 2030, so Mayor Muriel Bowser introduced legislation last week to sell bonds on that future revenue, in order to “transform the stadium into a vibrant, state-of-the-art venue that competes with newer facilities.” Nationals owners the Lerner family reportedly already extended their lease through “the 2058-59 season” as part of the ballpark fund deal, which raises questions about whether somebody thinks baseball will be played in the winter by then, possibly because D.C. summers will be too damn hot to go outside in.
The Nationals money is part of a spree of district spending on sports facilities, coming on top of $515 million in upgrade cash for the Wizards and Capitals arena and $6.6 billion for a new Washington Commanders stadium. (That Commanders number should probably now be $6.9 billion, as the council just added $305 million in subway and bus upgrades for the stadium; while those are transit upgrades that anyone will be able to use, they’re also upgrades that will mostly benefit the Commanders, so it’s probably fair to count them as a Commanders subsidy, stadium math is hard!) Bowser has so far opposed spending $300 million on upgrades to D.C. United‘s eight-year-old stadium, but the council will still be discussing that plan later this month. At least at that point D.C. will be out of stadiums to upgrade, at least until the Commanders’ stadium turns eight in 2038, if there’s a risk of any players being unhappy because the parking garages aren’t visually appealing enough.
Programming note: I’ll be traveling through October 19, so expect posts here to be a bit more sporadic than usual and possibly at odd times of day. There may or may not be a Friday roundup this week, or maybe it’ll be a Saturday roundup, consider it a fun surprise!