Missourians say team owners should pay majority of new stadium costs, new poll shows
As the Kansas City Chiefs and Royals weigh their futures in Missouri, a new poll shows that Missouri voters believe team owners should pay for the lion’s share of new stadium construction costs.
The poll, released Thursday by Saint Louis University and British pollster YouGov found that Missouri voters believe owners should pay for an average of 67% of stadium costs. Respondents think local and state governments should each pay an average of 17% of the costs, the poll found.
The results offer the most recent portrait of Missourians’ thoughts on whether local and state governments should provide public funding for stadiums. It comes after Kansas passed an aggressive bonding plan to try to lure one or both of the teams across the state line.
The new survey of 900 likely Missouri voters was conducted between Aug. 8 and Aug. 16 and has a margin of error of 3.79%. The poll also asked voters to weigh in on a host of other issues, including results that suggest voters support ballot measures to enshrine abortion rights and raise the minimum wage.
Unlike other questions that asked voters to provide yes-no answers to their thoughts on political questions, the stadium questions asked respondents to provide what percentage owners and local and state governments should pay for stadium construction costs.
“Missourians, on average, thought that owners should…pay for about two-thirds of the sports stadiums that are newly built,” Steve Rogers, an associate professor of political science at Saint Louis University who directed the poll. “This speaks very much to what’s going on in Kansas City with the Chiefs as well as the Royals.”
The results come as Missouri lawmakers have held a string of meetings with the Chiefs and Royals as officials weigh how best to respond to Kansas’ attempt to attract the teams.
While no concrete plan has emerged, Gov. Mike Parson has expressed confidence that Missouri could develop an attractive package for the teams over the next few months. Earlier this week, the Jackson County Legislature rejected a proposal to put a Chiefs-only sales tax measure on the November ballot in an attempt to keep the team.
The ongoing bidding war for the two teams comes after Jackson County voters in April rejected a stadium tax in April that would have effectively guaranteed the teams would stay in Missouri after their 25-year leases expire in January 2031.
This story was originally published August 29, 2024 at 6:30 AM.
