It’s become common in recent years for team owners and stadium district bureaucrats to start demanding upgrades to sports facilities earlier and earlier, sometimes when the buildings in question are 20 years old or less. But, you may be thinking, would anyone have the chutzpah to ask for major upgrades to a stadium that hasn’t even reached its 10th birthday? The answer is yes, and the stadium is the Minnesota Vikings‘:
U.S. Bank Stadium is well-maintained and wearing well for its age, but to keep it that way for another decade, it’ll cost roughly a quarter of a billion dollars, according to a report from architecture firm Populous.
The Kansas City, Missouri-based company presented a cost estimate of $230,990,503 for stadium maintenance and an additional $47,812,500 estimate (over 10 years) to build the second phase of the venue’s secured perimeter to the Minnesota Sports Facilities Board Friday morning.
That comes to $279 million, which is a sizable chunk of change, even for a stadium that cost taxpayers $1.1 billion to build in the first place. What on earth would cost so much?
The first cost can be broken down as follows:
• $80,574,375 for architecture and interiors
• $55,401,857 for A/V systems
• $27,325,272 for electrical and lighting systems
• $25,137,887 for technology systems
• $21,390,351 for structural systems
• $9,606,478 for the landscape and hardscape of the site
• $6,459,307 for mechanical, plumbing and fire protections
• $5,094,976 for graphics and wayfinding (building signage and site signage)
That is an awfully mixed bag of stuff, even within some of those categories: “architecture and interiors” could include anything from structural work to furniture, and “A/V systems” specifically includes things like the TV screens at concession stands, which one wouldn’t think would normally be the responsibility of the landlord. (The Minnesota Sports Facilities Authority is a state body that owns the Vikings’ stadium, though the team owners get the revenue from NFL games there.) And, of course, there’s the fact that the laundry list was compiled for the authority by Populous, who as one of the most prominent stadium design firms both should have a firm grip on the cost of upgrades and also has a huge conflict of interest as a firm that will very likely be bidding to do the upgrades.
But, no worries, the original stadium deal set aside a reserve fund for such future expenses, right?
“Is there sufficient money to cover these? The answer to that is no,” said Minnesota Sports Facilities Authority (MSFA) Chair Michael Vekich. “That is the work that we have to do collectively with [stadium operator] ASM, the Minnesota Vikings and … the governor and the Legislature.”
The Vikings and the public make annual contributions to the stadium capital improvement fund, which sits at just over $16 million. The audio-visual room — one of the areas that will need work soon — is alone expected to cost $14 million, the report said.
There is a separate “stadium reserve fund” that has $368 million in it — resulting from better-than-expected proceeds from the tablet-gambling revenues that were initially supposed to pay for the whole stadium, but ended up having to be supplemented with other state money when they started off slow — but the state is thinking of using that to pay off some of its stadium construction debt early. So it sounds like the sports authority is looking to get even more money authorized for additional repairs and upgrades, unless by “work with the governor and the Legislature” Vekich means something other than asking for public cash.
(There’s been no public statement thus far on the renovation proposal from Vikings owner Zygi Wilf, but it’s hard to imagine the authority would have floated this without at least running it by him.)
Anyway, this $279 million in new expense would be worth it, according to Populous architect Brady Spencer, because it would be “protecting your investment in the stadium.” Exactly what kind of protection Spencer was talking about wasn’t clear — Minnesotans wouldn’t get any additional tax or rent money from the Vikings in exchange, or any commitment by the team to extend their lease, or really anything at all — but as all grifters know, the best way to separate a fool from their money is by calling it an investment.
If our massive debts bring on a new “Great Depression”, at least it will put a stop to the insane public subsidies of sports venues. “Always look on the bright side of life.”
1) Government debt doesn’t really bring on economic depressions, though I suppose if the government cuts way back on spending and hikes taxes to cover budget holes, it could.
2) Elected officials are historically just as susceptible to arguments of “times are bad, we need to subsidize development to create jobs” as to arguments of “times are good, we can afford to subsidize development.” So I’m not sure a depression would have much impact on stadium subsidies, unless it encouraged the election of Zombie FDR as president maybe.
Hilarious!
$1.1 billion dollars and it’s
falling apart after 7 years?
A new record!
From the list above it looks to me like their might be $20-30m in actual bona fide upgrades that are either needed now or might be in the next 15 years (which is much more likely). A/V, electrical, plumbing/safety and Tech enhancements might be reasonable (in a decade but probably not now) as these things do change quickly. But I do not believe any of the numbers quoted.
I would follow Matheson’s (?) sports stadium economic impact rule and add up the numbers for those categories and, give or take, move the decimal one place to the left.
And if $250m in upgrades are somehow needed this soon, I certainly wouldn’t be hiring either the original architects or contractors to do them. They would be off my supplier list forever if their work doesn’t even make a decade of use.
I would be suing them.
Of course then I’d have
to prove the charges were real. Thanks for your input! I know nothing about construction.
Are tablet-gaming revenues the money that was to come from pull-tabs?
Yeah, e-pulltabs = iPad gambling = tablet gaming. It took a while for the money to start to come in, but once it did and was added to the cigarette money, it created a bit of a surplus in the capital fund.
Just a clarification, then, is the e-tab money now outpacing what legislators claimed it would raise or does it still need to be subsidized by other sources of state revenue?
In some ways, it doesn’t really matter given that one form of state sponsored gambling tends to just cannibalize revenue from others, but I didn’t see anything in the linked article to say whether the pulltabs can actually be classified as generating more than they were supposed to or if they still have to be subsidized by a corporate surtax (or the sale of non consentually harvested human organs etc).
I wonder what Piggy has to say about this…
The e-pulltab revenue was originally supposed to provide $348 million (in 2012 dollars), and it’s now racked up $368 million (in 2023 dollars). So it hasn’t quite gotten to where it promised to, but maybe will eventually?
I haven’t been able to find solid numbers for how much cigarette tax money has been spent on stadium bond payments (the first year’s payment was $30 million, after that the press seemed to lose interest). If the state uses the e-pulltab money to pay down remaining debt, that’s at least money that doesn’t have to come from other sources — though in any case it’s coming out of one state pocket or another, so the total subsidy is the same.
While US Bank Stadium cost larger than 1 billion dollars, not all of it was public paper. The Vikings paid (reportedly) $572 million of it. That figure is mentioned via https://www.stadiumsofprofootball.com/stadiums/us-bank-stadium/.
That $572m figure is wrong, since it doesn’t account for either operating subsidies or tax breaks. The math behind the $1.1B subsidy total is included at the link given above.