Jackson County sports authority sees no need to investigate ‘concrete cancer’ at the K
The Jackson County Sports Complex Authority has no plans to launch an investigation into the claim that Arrowhead Stadium does not suffer from the “concrete cancer” that allegedly afflicts Kauffman Stadium.
County Executive Frank White and legislator Jeanie Lauer, chair of the county legislature, asked for that investigation this week after Chiefs President Mark Donovan raised the issue at a news conference last week.
“One team got a good batch of concrete, and one team didn’t,” Donovan said.
Donovan was responding to a question as to why the Chiefs would want to remain at Arrowhead for another 40 years, while the Royals have cited deteriorating concrete at Kauffman as one reason that staying there long term is not an option.
But it’s not the main reason the Royals say that they will not be playing at Kauffman Stadium after their lease expires after the 2030 season. For business reasons, they want to play in a new taxpayer-financed stadium in the Crossroads area next to downtown by 2028.
However, the team did raise the issue more than a year ago in announcing its decision to leave the Truman Sports Complex, explaining that replacing broken concrete and making upgrades to The K would cost as much or more than a new stadium.
Opponents of a new ballpark and the proposed 40-year sales tax that would help finance it questioned the veracity of Donovan’s comment. How could it be that one stadium’s concrete was failing and the other’s wasn’t?
White and Lauer both opposed putting the stadium sales tax measure on the ballot. In their March 1 letter to sports complex authority chairman Shawn Foster, they said the public needs to know whether Kauffman is in worse shape than Arrowhead.
“Mr Donovan has publicly stated that Arrowhead Stadium does not suffer from ‘concrete cancer’... whereas Kauffman Stadium, constructed in the same period and ostensibly with the same materials, does due to a purportedly ‘bad batch’ of concrete.
“This assertion raises significant questions, particularly as the Jackson County Sports Complex Authority’s annual facility report had made no mention of ASR or similar structural concerns.”
The Royals have said those annual reports differ in scope from the reports they commissioned that focus on the long-term viability of the stadium.
Foster agreed with that characterization in a March 6 letter emailed to White and Lauer and posted on the sports authority’s web site.
He noted that both stadiums show signs of concrete cancer, in that there are cracks and spalling, which occurs when the steel reinforcement bars inside the concrete rust and deteriorate.
Both teams have made repairs to fix those problems and both stadiums are structurally sound, he said. But decades from now, that could change.
Kauffman, he noted, has undergone more wear and tear than Arrowhead over the past 50 years, hosting 81 games a year versus the Chiefs’ nine regular home games each year, as well other events.
“...we caution against conflating the current condition of Kauffman stadium with the long-term viability of the stadium. They are two separate issues,” he wrote.
This story was originally published March 8, 2024 at 5:37 PM.
