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A spokesman for the owner of the Cleveland Browns, the Haslam Sports Group, told NEOtrans that they have sent a letter today to Cuyahoga County Executive Chris Ronayne stating they will move forward without the county’s support, and saying they believe building an enclosed stadium in Brook Park is the only long-term stadium solution for the region.
HSG’s spokesperson said the letter, from HSG’s Chief Operating Officer Dave Jenkins, responded to “misleading statements that the county executive continues to convey,” he said. HSG said it hopes to get public financing, including county backing, for half of the Brook Park stadium’s $2.4 billion cost to get it opened by the 2029 football season.
The letter makes it clear that, although having the county participate in this project would be “best for the region, we are willing to move forward without their support,” HSG’s spokesperson said. Jenkins slammed Ronayne and, by extension, Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, for their actions, claiming they were holding back the region’s success. Ronayne has countered by calling the Brook Park stadium “a money grab” by the billionaire couple Jimmy and Dee Haslam.
“It is truly disheartening to see you, as county executive, actively work against a potential $600 million investment from the state that would be paired with $2 billion+ in private investment for an unprecedented $3 billion+ economic development project centrally located in Cuyahoga County,” Jenkins wrote. “These are the types of inexplicable decisions that keep the Greater Cleveland region from thriving, while other regions like Columbus and Cincinnati continue to grow and evolve.”
In the letter, Jenkins said, “We have made every effort to work with you to find a unified vision for a long-term stadium solution that will be transformative for our city, county and state. We have worked methodically to find the most responsible solve for our region that is based on facts. I am sending this letter to clearly articulate those so you do not continue to communicate misleading information.”
Jenkins said HSG has comprehensively looked at every stadium option over the last eight years. In so doing, he said in the letter that renovating the stadium and putting more than $1 billion into a “short-term fix that would present the same dilemma 15 to 20 years from now” is neither a strategic nor a fiscally responsible long-term approach.
He argued that the city of Cleveland and Cuyahoga County have “failed to put forth a viable economic solution” to renovate the existing, 1999-built stadium, including the “glaring omission” of a solution for capital repairs and an over-reliance on dollars from the city’s general fund. The Browns’ lease at the existing lakefront stadium ends after the 2028 football season.
Jenkins slammed the county for “suffering economic hardships” including cost overruns with the Consolidated County Jail and more than 600 jobs that are being moved from Downtown Cleveland to suburban Garfield Heights. Ronayne and his backers at Downtown Cleveland Inc. reportedly consider the Browns' move to Brook Park a greater threat to downtown businesses than the loss of 600 jail workers.
“In this context, the county should be enabling projects that generate county revenues, and the Brook Park project will generate millions annually for the county,” Jenkins wrote. “The Brook Park funding model does not rely on any funding from the city of Cleveland, yet the city will benefit from the significant activity and year-round use of a world-class dome in the region that is only 15 minutes from downtown,” he said.
HSG’s primary request from Cuyahoga County is to maximize Brook Park revenues by leveraging the county’s credit and issuing bonds that will be paid back through new revenues generated from the project. But Ronayne has questioned the soundness of those revenue projections, calling them “overly optimistic.” He said he wasn’t willing to risk the county’s credit rating on those projections.
Those projections were made when HSG touted the Brook Park stadium as offering the “Furthest east dome in the United States” and will host large events that could draw visitors from the East Coast. But last month, the Washington Commanders football team announced a partnership with the mayor of Washington, D.C., to build a $4 billion domed stadium by 2030 on the site of Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium, now being demolished.
HSG claims that the Brook Park stadium will generate hundreds of millions in excess project tax revenues that could be shared with the city of Cleveland and other county needs. That claim is based on the Brook Park stadium being an enclosed facility that could host year-round events rather than 10-12 events per year at the open-air lakefront stadium.
“The Brook Park project will be additive to, rather than destructive of, downtown,” Jenkins said. HSG is also seeking a $600 million in debt financing from the state for the Brook Park stadium, something that two reports from two different branches of state government considered “risky.”
“Our ask of the state is to leverage the substantial new incremental tax revenues generated by the project to produce a return for the Ohio taxpayers – unlike a short-sighted renovation plan, the state investment is not a ‘risky bet’ for taxpayers,” he said.
HSG proposes to invest at least $1.2 billion in private funding in the Brook Park stadium plus any cost overruns and another $800 million plus in private investment together with its partners into the adjacent mixed-use development. Combined, Jenkins called it one of the largest economic development projects in the history of Northeast Ohio.
“To further clear up misinformation, while we have not given up on our elusive goal of local unity, and the upside for the public is far greater with the county’s partnership, we remain undeterred and are not relying on the county’s participation to execute this project,” Jenkins wrote.
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