NASHVILLE, Tennessee – Nashville’s East Bank Stadium Committee met Wednesday evening in the Council Chambers at City Hall to take its first critical look at the Tennessee Titans stadium proposal announced last week by Nashville Mayor John Cooper and the team.
The meeting was held a day after the team shared renderings of its new potential stadium, created by the same architectural firm that worked on Las Vegas’s Allegiant Stadium.
The committee meeting, scheduled to start at 4:30 p.m., began about a half hour late due to technical difficulties with the PowerPoint presentation, the review of which was the stated purpose of the meeting.
Caption: Tennessee Titans President and CEO Burke Nihill attended the October 26, 2022, meeting of the East Bank Stadium Committee.
Several members of the Titans organization were in attendance, including President and CEO Burke Nihill, who sat in the front row for the duration of the meeting, as well as 10 to 20 other attendees.
Vice Mayor Jim Shulman announced the establishment of the East Bank Stadium Committee in late June.
The seven-member committee, consisting of At-Large Councilmember and committee Chair Bob Mendes as well as council members Kyonzte Toombs (District 02), Sean Parker (District 05), Brett Withers (District 06), Kevin Rhoten (District 14), Thom Druffel (District 23) and Antoinette Lee (District 33), have had five meetings to date, but this was the first after the stadium deal announcement and the council received the resolution to approve the term sheet from the mayor.
Several other council members not on the committee were also in attendance.
The purpose of the meeting was a presentation by the mayor’s office regarding the non-binding term sheet that describes the terms and conditions of the agreements and transactions required to finance, construct and operate a new, enclosed, multi-purpose stadium.
The mayor’s office was represented by the city’s Finance Director Kelly Flannery, who took a lead role during the meeting; Deputy Mayor for Policy and Innovation Sam Wilcox; two representatives from Inner Circle Sports, a New York City-based boutique investment bank focused on sports and entertainment that is advising Metro on the negotiations; Franklin Jones, shareholder of multinational law firm Greenberg Traurig; and a representative from Tennessee-based law firm Bass, Berry & Sims.
Flannery, who began the review of the 11-slide Power Point presentation, said the goal for the meeting was to get a reaction to the term sheet and the expectations for the next few months on what the councilmembers need to approve the proposal.
In wrapping up the formal presentation, Flannery said the mayor’s office has not been great at giving adequate time to review legislation. Still, this timeline gives a four-to-six-month time frame for the councilmembers to do their homework.
She repeated on several occasions that this was a special opportunity to resolve the situation with the current stadium that is an unfunded liability.
A report from VSG (Venue Solutions Group), detailing the improvements needed to achieve the “first-class condition” of the existing Nissan Stadium as required in the current lease agreement, is expected to be provided to the council next week. The report is supposed to explain the $1.8 billion price tag for the improvements, so that a proper comparison to the $2.1 billion for the new stadium can be conducted.
Flannery said there are three pieces of legislation circulating including the term sheet, the approval for a request for proposal for the development team for the East Bank campus and the approval of the 1 percent increase to the hotel tax – one of the key elements to fund Nashville’s $760 million contribution to the stadium.
Flannery, in pushing for the term sheet approval, said it wasn’t fair to their partner – the team – to ask them to continue spending without it. While confirming the term sheet is non-binding, Flannery emphasized that it is meaningful. Flannery expressed hope for a head nod from the council by the year’s end.
The push for the approval to increase the hotel tax, according to Flannery, is because of the length of time it takes to implement.
According to the schedule Flannery proposed during the presentation and later discussed, definitive documents would be provided to and approved by the council and the Sports Authority in February 2023.
When the formal presentation concluded, Mendes opened up the meeting for questions, which several council members – committee and non-committee members alike – took advantage of.
For nearly an hour, council members Druffel, Mendes, Parker, Russ Bradford (District 13), Tom Cash (District 18), Courtney Johnston (District 26) and Delishia Porterfield (District 29) peppered the mayor’s team with questions on a wide range of topics relative to the stadium, the village and the campus.
Both Mendes and Johnston gave strong pushback to Flannery, and said as much directly to the finance director.
Mendes said he was aggressively pushing back, due to being “hustled” previously in round one of negotiations when the agreement was supposedly non-binding, only to be held to what was considered to be a commitment in round two.
Johnston called it “alarming,” and said it felt like the request to approve the legislation was putting the cart before the horse. Johnston also said that the finance director should approach the issue more neutrally.
While the presentation focused on the stadium, there were numerous questions regarding details on the funding, many of which could not be answered, as well as the stadium village and campus, where recouped development rights will allow Metro to build affordable housing, transit and park facilities.
Based on the type and tone of the questions from council members, some of which seemed adversarial, none appeared to be convinced of the proposal.
Council questions unanswered during the meeting will be submitted to the administration and posted along with previously-asked questions on the East Bank Stadium committee’s webpage.
The next meeting of the committee is scheduled for Wednesday, November 2 at 4:30 p.m. in the Council Chambers for the Titans to present their community benefits platform and to review the community benefits agreements.
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Laura Baigert is a senior reporter at The Star News Network, where she covers stories for The Tennessee Star.
