Nashville approves $1.2B to replace Titans’ 23-year-old stadium, over massive opposition by public speakers

Well, that went exactly as expected:

Nashville cemented a historic $2.1 billion agreement to build a new, enclosed stadium for the Tennessee Titans on largely underdeveloped Metro land along the east bank of the Cumberland River.

The deal is the largest in Nashville’s history and includes at least $1.26 billion in public funding, making it the largest public subsidy for a stadium in U.S. history.

Nashville’s council signed off on the agreement with a 26–12 final vote early Wednesday morning after an impassioned five-hour public hearing in which nearly 70% of speakers opposed the deal.

There are more details, but they’re basically as you know them by now: a $2.1 billion stadium project, with the state kicking in $500 million and the city $760 million. It will indeed be the largest stadium subsidy in U.S. history, breaking the $1 billion mark set by the Buffalo Bills just last year. Construction is expected to be complete by 2027, or maybe 2026, depending on which paragraph of the news coverage you read.

This comes as no surprise, given that the Nashville metro council had already voted multiple times in favor of the subsidy by large margins over the past few months. But it’s still a major milestone in the ever-growing funneling of public funds to pro sports team owners: Over public opposition, Nashville Mayor John Cooper and Titans owner Amy Adams Strunk — the latter of whose name somehow didn’t appear once in the Tennessean’s long news article about the stadium vote — managed to piece together more than $1.2 billion in taxpayer cash to spend on a new stadium, on the grounds that the team’s 23-year-old one was hopelessly outdated and would be even more expensive to upgrade, because team execs said so, and they wouldn’t lie to us, now would they? The lobbyists certainly helped, and the fawning coverage by the Tennessean newspaper certainly helped, but in the end, 26 out of 38 metro councilmembers voted for this thing, which is a remarkable reminder of just how much sway billionaires and their friends have over government decision-making in this country, through a combination of empty promises, mostly empty threats, and filling the room at the right parties.

Let’s turn this over to primary stadium-deal opponents Councilmember Bob Mendes and Kennesaw State University economist J.C. Bradbury for some final words:

I’m hearing people think the East Bank will have a transportation corridor with new roads, parks, greenways, streets, sidewalks, and affordable housing.

None of that is included in the stadium’s $2.1 billion purchase price! That’s all extra coming from the metro general fund.

— Bob Mendes (@mendesbob) April 26, 2023

This deal also highlights how ignorant our elected leaders are about basic public finance. Like, not able to pass an undergraduate course bad. The statements by supporting representatives revealed them to be incompetent. That's not hyperbole, that's the correct term.

— J.C. Bradbury (@jc_bradbury) April 26, 2023

And that’s a wrap. Unless someone in power gets caught engaging in fraudulent helicopter registration and the whole deal unexpectedly falls apart, which seems unlikely to happen a second time, but we can certainly dream.