KSHB 41 reporter Tod Palmer covers sports business and eastern Jackson County. Have a story idea to share with Tod? Send him an e-mail.
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The race to become Missouri’s next governor is set — and it’s good news for fans hoping that the Kansas City Chiefs and Royals will stay in Missouri.
“Both gubernatorial candidates who got through the other day — both Republican Mike Kehoe and Democrat Crystal Quade — both have said they want to keep the Chiefs and the Royals in the state of Missouri,” Mayor Quinton Lucas said Wednesday at Chiefs training camp in St. Joseph. “Both of them have made clear that this is an important economic-development issue for the state of Missouri and the city of Kansas City.”
Kehoe, who currently serves as Missouri’s lieutenant governor, defeated Bill Eigel and Jay Ashcroft in Tuesday’s primary.
He is the only one of the top three GOP candidates who expressed support for efforts to retain the Chiefs and Royals.
“I absolutely think we should keep the Chiefs and Royals here,” Kehoe said Monday at a campaign stop in Kansas City. “Here’s why — it’s an economic development conversation. It’s not about a Major League Baseball or football team. It’s about somebody who has an impact on our state’s economy to employ people here. The ripple effect into our community is unbelievable. ... We want to make sure the Chiefs and Royals stay Missourians.”
Quade's campaign responded Thursday:
Ensuring our back-to-back Super Bowl-winning Chiefs and the Royals stay in Missouri should have been a priority well before Kansas ever had the chance to swoop in. Governor Parson has been asleep at the wheel, letting Kansas steal our teams, and we’ve yet to see any plan to keep them in Missouri. There’s no reason to believe Mike Kehoe will take action and lead our state when this administration has failed.
As governor, Crystal Quade will work with the teams to get a deal done that keeps them home while making sure we support our workers and small business owners. We won’t bail out billionaires on the backs of taxpayers and any deal will need to benefit local businesses and the workers who help make Kansas City a world-class city.
Jackson County voters rejected a sales-tax extension in April that would have renovated GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium and built a new baseball stadium in the northeast corner of the Crossroads Arts District, where the former Kansas City Star printing press sits.
Two months later, the Kansas Legislature approved changes to STAR Bonds, allowing the bonds to pay for up to 70% of a development’s cost, with an eye toward poaching the Chiefs or Royals.
“A lot of people thought that was the end of the game or you’re in the fourth quarter,” Lucas said. “I think after the sales tax vote failed in April, we started anew. We are in a whole new game.”
One that probably will end up more expensive for taxpayers, whether the teams wind up in Kansas or Missouri.
New game or not, Chiefs President Mark Donovan made it clear the clock’s still ticking, saying the team wants a decision on its future home within six months in mid-July.
Lucas, who endorsed Quade before the primary for the Democratic nomination, said Kansas City can make an end-of-the-year deadline work.
“It would be my hope that — to the extent that there are solutions, and we're working hard to make sure we have them — that you're talking about a mid-fall kind of post-election season solution,” Lucas said. “I would love nothing more than for whomever is the governor elect of Missouri to be able to, the week after (the election), to announce that there is a plan for retention of both teams.”
It remains important to some voters.
“The Chiefs and the Royals belong in Missouri,” Jackson County voter George Anderson said Tuesday as he voted in the primary election. “That’s where they need to stay.”
The Chiefs remain open to renovating Arrowhead, but also will explore options for a new stadium, whether that’s in Kansas or Missouri.
The Royals also are open to any conversation about a new stadium, but the team’s long-stated preference has been a downtown stadium.
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