Special session likely in Missouri on Chiefs, Royals stadium incentives

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - Missouri’s governor is hoping to get lawmakers back in the capitol to prevent the Chiefs and Royals from running off to Kansas.

Missouri is running out of time to make the Kansas City Chiefs and Royals an offer to keep their stadiums in the state. Governor Mike Kehoe is now tossing around the idea of a special session to complete an incentives package. He gave no specific date, but the governor wants to come up with an incentives plan before Kansas’s STAR bonds offer expires on June 30.

Kehoe is making it a priority to get an incentives package in front of the Kansas City Chiefs and Royals. The two teams have been in talks with both Missouri and Kansas about wanting to upgrade their stadiums, a multi-billion dollar project, and Kansas is already presenting a competitive offer.

To keep the teams, and the $50 million in tax revenue they generate, Kehoe is tossing out the idea of a special legislative session.

“It’s an important piece of economic development and we definitely will be looking for a way to try to get that back before the general assembly,” Kehoe said.

Kehoe has from Kansas City-native and House Minority Leader Ashley Aune. She said the cost of a special session is well-worth the economic impact the teams make in her city and around the state.

“There is a price tag you can put on that, but there is truly not a price tag you can put on all of the goodwill that comes from having these teams,” Aune said.

But her counterparts in the Senate may be harder to get on board. When a bill containing $500 million for projects like hospitals, university research and convention centers was thrown out --

Democratic Senators like Barbara Washington lost their drive to work across the aisle.

“A special session that’s only for the Chiefs, I think we’ve got to come together and evaluate that,” Washington said. “What is best for Missouri, 6.2 million Missourians? And we need to make sure that we’re taking care of the most vulnerable of Missourians, and a lot of that was in House Bill 19.”

Kehoe did not shut down the notion of including projects cut from the state budget in the call for a special session.

“I understand what their concerns are, and I think it’s fair to say everything is on the table as far as what that special session might look like,” Kehoe said.

There is likely to be a local component to any stadium incentives, and that could be more challenging than getting the lawmakers on board. A St. Louis University YouGov poll shows 70% of likely Missouri voters think the team should pay for their own stadium, rather than the government.

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