The Rays were recently sold to a Florida-based group who announced they were committed to finding a new stadium site in the Tampa Bay area.<\/p>\n
Now, per Marc Topkin in the Tampa Bay Times<\/a>, they have found such a site and released renderings of a potential new stadium. You can see one of the renderings at the top of this post. There are more renderings at the article link (and also here at our SB Nation Rays site DRays Bay<\/a>), but here\u2019s a potential stumbling block:<\/p>\n Tampa Sports Authority CEO Eric Hart told the Tampa Bay Times last week that the team had estimated the cost of the stadium at $2.3 billion. Hagan said Wednesday \u201cthat number is not firm.\u201d<\/p>\n Per county documents, the Rays say they will pay at least 50% of the stadium cost, plus cover construction over-runs, future repairs, maintenance and renovations.<\/p>\n The Rays are asking the county to cover the other 50%<\/a> through various funding sources with potential other contributions from the city of Tampa and the state. The commission voted Wednesday to proceed with the negotiations<\/a>.<\/p>\n Ah, ha. Let\u2019s see, half of $2.3 billion is $1.15 billion and that\u2019s an awful lot of public money for a stadium. We know, from decades of such payments, that they never, ever pay off for the locality that provides the money. A perfect example is the new stadium in Atlanta, which got $300 million of public money from Cobb County, Georgia \u2014 which then ran into a shortfall looking for money for new libraries and other things for the public good.<\/p>\n When things like this are proposed, I always check out Neil DeMause\u2019s excellent Field of Schemes site to see what he has to say about this one, and DeMause does not disappoint<\/a>:<\/p>\n The Tampa Sports Authority, meanwhile, also met this week to discuss the Rays plans, and revealed that it will eventually release two, let\u2019s call them \u201creports\u201d,<\/a> by their favorite consultants Skanska and AECOM<\/a> \u2014 one on whether the $2.3 billion stadium will actually cost $2.3 billion, the other reviewing the Rays\u2019 own economic projections for the project. (The AECOM report is expected to be ready by April 1, the Skanska one will be sometime later.) Board member Andy Scaglione also asked if anyone had appraised the value of the Dale Mabry campus (nope) and how much money was available in hotel tax funds for tourism spending that could go toward a stadium ($11-12 million, which won\u2019t go far toward that $1.15 billion nut).<\/p>\n So, this one\u2019s still a long way from being approved\/completed\/actually built.<\/p>\n Incidentally, the Dale Mabry campus noted in the Field of Schemes article is directly adjacent to Steinbrenner Field and Raymond James Stadium, where the NFL\u2019s Tampa Bay Buccaneers play:<\/p>\n
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