Chiefs proprietor says leaving Arrowhead Stadium is an choice after gross sales tax funding was rejected

The Kansas Metropolis Chiefs plan to discover choices that embody leaving Arrowhead Stadium after voters in Jackson County, Missouri, soundly rejected a gross sales tax initiative that will have helped to pay for renovations to the 52-year-old constructing.

The Chiefs and Royals, whose Kauffman Stadium shares the Truman Sports activities Advanced with the soccer stadium, have relied on a three-eighths cent gross sales tax for maintenance. The franchises wished to increase that tax with the Royals utilizing their share of the cash for a brand new downtown ballpark and the Chiefs envisioning an $800 million renovation of Arrowhead.

Greater than 58% of voters rejected the gross sales tax initiative after the marketing campaign was met with criticism from all sides.

“Time is brief for us at this level and so we have to see what different choices are on the market for us,″ Chiefs proprietor Clark Hunt stated Saturday. “Once we began on this course of three years in the past, it felt like we had a really very long time — a protracted runway with about 9 1/2 (years) left on our lease. We’re now down to six 1/2 and so I do really feel very a lot of a way of urgency.”

Hunt, whose father Lamar based the Chiefs and helped to get Kauffman and Arrowhead stadiums constructed, has at all times most popular to renovate a stadium that his father referred to as considered one of his favourite locations on this planet. The Hunt household had promised to spend $300 million in non-public funds on the renovation with the rest coming from public funding.

Now, the Chiefs are left to think about overtures from different areas. A type of may very well be simply throughout the state line, the place public officers in Kansas have made it clear that they might like to have the Chiefs on their facet of the border.

“Stadium improvement initiatives simply take a very long time,” Hunt stated, “and I do not wish to put a particular quantity on it, however with solely 6 1/2 years left on the lease, we will need to work very onerous over the following yr, year-and-a-half.”

No matter path the Chiefs go subsequent, Hunt indicated they might head that means on their very own, reasonably than be tied along with the Royals. That might give the NFL franchise larger latitude to hunt the perfect financing bundle for itself, whether or not which means with a renovation of Arrowhead Stadium in thoughts or a totally new facility elsewhere.

“There is definitely nothing to preclude us coming again and doing one thing collectively,” Hunt stated, “however (Royals proprietor John Sherman) additionally feels that sense of urgency and I do know he is desperate to attempt to discover a long-term resolution, which we’re as nicely.”

Reporting by The Related Press.

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