A Kansas City Council committee on Tuesday advanced a plan for building and funding a new downtown Royals stadium.
The plan gives $600 million toward the ballpark and directs the city manager to finalize agreements with the Royals, developers and incentive agencies to build the stadium. It also rezones the Crown Center area for a ballpark district.
Public testimony, about evenly mixed in favor and opposed to the stadium plan, dominated Tuesday's finance committee hearing. But in the end, the committee voted unanimously to approve the plan after last week's delay and send it to the full council to consider on Thursday.
Moments after the final vote, Mayor Quinton Lucas, the sponsor of the ordinances, verbally beamed in a news release.
“Today is a homerun for Kansas City. The Royals and Hallmark downtown will bring millions of people to our city core," the mayor said, "build thousands of jobs in the heart of our region, and will extend benefits to every corner of Kansas City and our area."
Headlining his release was the expectation that the full council will rubber stamp the $1.9 billion plan quickly. Rezoning of the Crown Center site was approved ahead of schedule by the City Plan Commission a couple of weeks ago.
A disproportionate amount of time was taken up debating the non-relocation agreement. One of a handful of requirements in the complex contract, the non-relocation agreement commits the Royals to staying in Kansas City for the terms of the lease, once those terms are negotiated.
Council member Johnathan Duncan said he was concerned that the deal does not treat residents and taxpayers as equity partners.
"We are receiving only $55 million in community benefits, which is not commensurate with the amount of investment that people are investing in this project," Duncan said. "The stadium is going to be owned by the city of Kansas City, but the city of Kansas City (is) not going to be a recipient of any portion of the revenue."
Lisa Miller, a leader of the grassroots organization of low-wage workers Stand Up KC, said the $600 million the city is putting toward the development of a new stadium is money that should go toward the improvement of the city and its services.
"Infrastructure, homelessness, better-paying jobs, affordable housing, roads. We have a lot of things in our city that need to be done and we need to focus more on building up our city first," she said.
In the course of sometimes contentious public comment, tensions erupted when one of the leaders of St. Louis-based Missouri Workers Power claimed supporters of the development were being given extra time. Public comment was limited to two minutes per person.
The man, identified by colleagues as Darrell Miller, is a worker at the current Royals stadium. After an angry outburst, Miller was forcibly removed from the chamber by security officers. Shouts of "let him go" echoed around the marble foyer as he was pinned to the ground and handcuffed. Officers of the Kansas City Police Department escorted the man down the elevator from the 24th floor.
In a news release, members of Missouri Workers Power voiced their fury at their colleague's arrest, adding their argument that the ordinances, and use of tax dollars, are unfair to Kansas City residents. The group is demanding to give people of Kansas City a chance to vote.
"Two years ago, voters rejected this deal," the group said in their release. "Now the Council is rushing it through in two weeks with no public vote, no released financial projections, and no real community benefits. This isn't economic development. It's a giveaway to a billionaire, paid for by workers."
