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Gene Frenette: Jaguars, city appear on a good track to close out deal on renovated NFL stadium
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- Gene Frenette: Jaguars, city appear on a good track to close out deal on renovated NFL stadium
In football parlance, the Jaguars and the city of Jacksonville have moved into the red zone toward reaching an agreement on a $1.4 billion renovated EverBank Stadium.
A touchdown is not yet 100 percent guaranteed, but enough progress appears to have been made that both sides feel confident the franchise and city will follow Buffalo and Nashville into ensuring Jacksonville's NFL team remains in Duval for another 30-plus years.
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Sure, there are significant T's to be crossed and I's to be dotted, none bigger than the parties coming to a resolution on the specific amount of taxpayer dollars to be shelled out for both the largest public and private investment in Jacksonville history.
For Jacksonville Jaguars president Mark Lamping (L) and team owner Shad Khan, coming to an agreement with the city of Jacksonville on a renovated stadium would be of monumental importance to the city's future.
Plus, there are probably around a dozen other ancillary agreements beyond the lease that must be resolved between the parties, according to Mike Weinstein, who serves as counsel to Mayor Donna Deegan in the negotiations. Among them is much-needed development in the Eastside neighborhood.
All that said, this deal is going to happen. Or should I say, it's on track toward happening.
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It'll become reality for one reason above all: Jaguars' owner Shad Khan, Deegan and all the important players working for each party deem a renovated stadium too critical to Jacksonville's future for it to die at the 11th hour.
Make no mistake, it's close to fish-or-cut-bait time. Nearly eight years of Jaguars' research, the dozens of community huddles explaining why a renovated stadium is necessary to keep the team in Jacksonville, the well-known cost of doing business with the NFL and consequences of losing a franchise, all of that is approaching a finish line.
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City Council at-large member Matt Carlucci, who was a big supporter of mayor Donna Deegan when she ran for office, believes she did the right thing by not taking over negotiations with the Jaguars on a renovated stadium and relying on input from professionals who have negotiated NFL stadium deals with other cities.
'A good investment'
Whispers around City Hall and other places suggested a proposal for how this $1.4 billion pie gets divided would come out of the shadows and into the public light next week.
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City Council president Ron Salem decided to jump the gun Wednesday when he told a joint meeting of the School Board and CC that a deal had been reached, which is not accurate, and that an invitation was extended to Jaguars president Mark Lamping and the mayor's office to present the terms in a special CC meeting on Tuesday May 14.
Salem's grandstanding aside, the terms being presented, even if the preliminary framework of a deal has been completed, is not the same thing as a deal being done.
Of course, all of this is still subject to negotiations that can move each side's financial obligation up or down. But the gist of a deal has already been heavily discussed by representatives from the Jaguars and the city, so nobody is going to get blindsided when the numbers come out.
City Councilman Matt Carlucci, who has served for 17 years, has been part of numerous Jaguars' negotiations in his political career. He's prepared for grumbling no matter the taxpayers' portion of the bill. Carlucci, who doesn't know the specific number, remains optimistic the public will see more benefits than drawbacks of reaching an agreement on a massive stadium upgrade.
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As a Republican who supported Deegan, a Democrat, when she ran for office, Carlucci likes the way the negotiation winds are blowing.
"I'm not expecting the worst," Carlucci told the Times-Union. "I know this will be expensive, but I feel it will be viewed as good news by the public. I have a good feeling about what's going to be proposed.
"Is everybody going to love it? No. But I think five years down the road, people will look back at it and say, 'This is a good investment.' "
Pro-active approach suits both sides
It's not like the Jaguars or the city went into two-minute offense mode to push this stadium deal forward.
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Both sides understood the enormous stakes a long time ago and prepared accordingly. The Jaguars, especially President Mark Lamping, have been meticulous in their resolve to make everybody aware that a renovated stadium (hundreds of millions of dollars cheaper than brand new ones in Buffalo and Nashville) is necessary to keep the team in Jacksonville.
While some people take that as a threat, the truth is it's the economic reality of playing in the NFL. The Jaguars are the last team in the league to not build a new or renovated stadium or reach an agreement on one.
Deegan, a newcomer to the political game, didn't act like she had all the answers to getting a stadium resolution, so the city hired some big guns to ensure a fair deal with the Jaguars could be executed.
The Sidley Austin law firm it brought in worked on behalf of the state of New York in its finalized negotiations with the Buffalo Bills ownership. That firm is also involved in ongoing negotiations with the Chicago Bears ' proposal to build a domed stadium on the lakefront, which figure to be far more contentious than Jacksonville.
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Both Weinstein and former Jaguars' executive Michael Huyghue, an NFL consultant hired to work on the city's behalf, have also navigated through their share of high-profile negotiations where big public dollars are at stake.
While the Jaguars and the city are careful not to say an agreement is a foregone conclusion, both sides are happy how things are progressing.
"Things have gone well right from the beginning," Weinstein said. "It was obvious the Jaguars want to stay here and the city wants them to stay here.
"We've been trying to figure out how to fairly reach a 30-year [lease] agreement on the biggest project the city will have done. It's continuing to move forward nicely, as smoothly and timely as others, if not quicker."
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Approaching a time crunch
The Jaguars are hopeful of finalizing an agreement with the city by early summer, which would allow the NFL plenty of time to evaluate it before their mid-October owners meeting.
Coincidentally, the timeline for owners to ratify an agreement between Jacksonville and the city would fall right in the middle of the Jaguars' back-to-back London games against the Chicago Bears and a likely non-division AFC opponent.
The owners' vote should be a formality as neither the Jaguars or the city would hammer out an agreement they didn't expect to get owner approval.
Considering the price tags for new stadiums in Buffalo and Nashville, which will be more expensive for taxpayers there, Lamping believes Jacksonville going the renovation route makes it easier to accept.
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"It's a ton of money, but in today's NFL stadium game," said Lamping, "it's a real good value to spend $1.4 billion and get a 30-year lease going into a renovated building."
Why this is a must-get-done deal
Whether Jacksonville taxpayers view the investment numbers with sticker shock or merely as the price of doing NFL business, the unmistakable reality is losing the Jaguars would carry a heavier price than paying for a renovated stadium.
As much as Jacksonville has struggled for decades to develop downtown, can you imagine how much harder that task becomes if Khan – the city's biggest single investor – were to move his team elsewhere because a stadium agreement fell through?
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Just ask football fans in St. Louis, Baltimore and Cleveland , two of which got NFL teams back, how much it stung when their owners packed up and left. Those are bigger markets than Jacksonville, which was lucky to get an expansion franchise in 1995 and might wait decades or longer to get another NFL team if Khan felt compelled to move.
Remember, too, Jacksonville is the only NFL market besides Green Bay with one major pro sports team. Losing the Jaguars would be a crippling blow, both financially and to the city's self-image.
It's not that an NFL team brings in a ton of jobs, but the economic ripple effect for Jacksonville of not having the Jaguars would be significant.
How long do you think the Florida-Georgia game, with its economic impact of $35 million, would remain viable here without a renovated EverBank Stadium?
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"It'd be gone, and we'd probably lose our game, too," said TaxSlayer Gator Bowl president Greg McGarity, the former athletic director at Georgia. "College football would cease to exist in Jacksonville because of competition from more attractive venues."
A state-of-the-art stadium isn't just a benefit for the Jaguars, but for other sporting events and concerts that help drive the city's economic engine.
Without a renovated EverBank, the chances for development around that venue with office space, restaurants and other amenities -- all of which were tabled for the city and Jaguars to focus on the stadium issue -- goes away as well.
Look, it's Jacksonville's turn to decide how much it values the Jaguars' 29-year existence. On the longshot possibility the city decides not to pony up to make sure the Jaguars are available for another generation of fans, losing the team would represent incalculable damage on multiple fronts.
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And if anybody thinks the Jaguars would stick around until the 2029 season conclusion when the current lease expires without a stadium agreement, forget it. The team would be gone well before then because Khan isn't likely waiting to move to his next destination.
Luckily, the city likely won't have to deal with that nightmarish hypothetical. The inescapable conclusion is Jacksonville knows it's much better off with the Jaguars than without them.
"I'm sure it's going to have quite the price tag and people will have all sorts of opinions [on the taxpayer cost]," said Carlucci. "But the overriding issue is keeping the Jaguars in Jacksonville. Period. Losing the Jaguars would probably be one of the biggest gut punches in our history."
Keeping the Jaguars will be expensive, but not as much as the price of losing them. That's why this renovated stadium must, and will, get done.
Gfrenette@jacksonville.com : (904) 359-4540
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Closing time: High stakes for Jaguars, city to finish deal on renovated stadium
