ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — There has been a lot of excitement at City Hall over the new Tampa Bay Rays stadium plans.
But the city and the county have not set dates yet to even vote on the agreement. And that’s needed before construction can begin.
St. Pete City Council members will be discussing the planned redevelopment of Tropicana Field on Thursday.
Today, city officials will go through a 113-page presentation that will give council members more details about the new stadium and redevelopment plan, including price tags and breakdowns of how money is being distributed across different aspects of the plan.
The new stadium would be part of the huge Gas Plant District redevelopment and end years of negotiations between the Rays and the city. It also would end the threat the Rays would pack up and leave Florida.
But some are questioning at what expense?
Costs for the ballpark would be $1.3 billion, with the team contribution expected to be about $700 million and the city and county paying the rest.
Rev. Manual Sykes, the Pastor of Bethel Community Baptist Church in St. Pete, said the money and land for the stadium could solve one of the city’s biggest problems right now: affordable housing.
“It would solve the housing crisis,” Sykes said. “We have 86 acres. Even if you gave the Rays 16 that they need for their stadium, you’d have 70 acres plus a couple hundred million dollars to solve the crisis, to underwrite affordable housing and workforce housing.”
Sykes also said the land the city would be selling to the Rays would be given away with a big discount.
Meanwhile, time is of the essence.
The Rays contract at Tropicana Field runs through the 2027 season.
In order for the team to be in the new ballpark for Opening Day 2028, work on the planning, designing and implementation of infrastructure needs to begin soon in order to begin construction by November 2024.
