Kansans never voted to move the Chiefs, and Arrowhead Stadium is KC’s heart | Opinion
During this season of giving and caring for friends and family, there is an undercurrent of sadness and grief in Kansas City. The Kansas City Chiefs have long united people across Kansas and Missouri. This holiday season, that unity has been fractured by greed. The only clear winners are the Hunt family. Fans, future success of the Chiefs, local economies, identity and NFL legacy are being disregarded for personal profit.
You may call me dramatic or resistant to change. You may say other fan bases have endured worse (see St Louis and Oakland). And you would be right: What happened to generations of fans and those cities was a tragedy. Despite knowing this, you may wonder why so many of us shed real tears when this news was announced.
Many Americans are perhaps just learning that the Kansas City Chiefs actually play in Missouri, not Kansas — and that there is both a KCK and a KCMO. The Missouri side of the metropolitan area is the cultural heart of Kansas City: downtown, Midtown, the Country Club Plaza, River Market and the Truman Sports Complex. On the Kansas side, it’s largely suburban. While the move may seem trivial to outsiders, it is not.
There has always been a friendly divide between the two states, full of stereotypes, but rarely real rifts. What crossed that divide was a shared absolute love for the Chiefs and Arrowhead Stadium. What other city proudly alters the national anthem to honor its team? From Little League games to 5K turkey trots, across state lines you hear it declared: “Home of the Chiefs!” We are loud, loyal, and united (hence the stadium’s Guinness decibel world record).
I was born a Chiefs fan in 1992, the daughter of a local high school football coach whose love for the team spans his own lifetime. Football shaped my childhood — listening to Mitch Holthus on the radio; growing up with Priest Holmes, Jamaal Charles, Tony Gonzalez and Trent Green; hearing stories of Marty Schottenheimer and Joe Montana. This was not fair-weather fandom. This was Arrowhead in losing seasons, cheap tickets, tailgate barbecue smoke and stubborn belief that “this was our year” — until recently, when it finally was our year, more than once. Arrowhead is not just a stadium. It is memory, tradition and identity.
Arrowhead is iconic. It is the third-oldest NFL stadium and one of the last with true soul and grit. Leaving it is deeply unpopular and culturally damaging. I now live in Minneapolis, but Arrowhead and my family are what keep bringing me back home to Kansas City. And while the Vikings’ stadium is impressive, it lacks the NFL tradition that is palpable at the oldest stadiums. It is not Arrowhead.
Public funding for teams costs taxpayers
Beyond emotion, the facts are clear: Public funding for stadiums has been shown — across more than 120 studies — to produce no net positive for taxpayers. The Hunt family is worth roughly $25 billion. Teams that play under a dome statistically perform worse in playoff games, cold or not, with dome or retractable roof teams having only around a 20% success rate of winning cold playoff games since 1990. Everyone is already struggling with inflation in groceries, child care, housing and health care. And Kansas taxpayers were never given a vote.
Jackson County voters resoundingly rejected a stadium deal in 2024. What is astonishing is that Kansas lawmakers ignored these well-documented facts and allowed themselves to be pitted against Missouri — at no financial gain to their constituents, and to the detriment of the very team they love. Billionaires knew what we all loved and could not bear to part with: the Chiefs. They used this deep love to play states against each other, and won.
And what stops this from happening again in 30 or 40 years? Nothing. This should be a warning to sports fans everywhere. No team is too ingrained, no fandom too loyal to be exploited for public handouts under threat of relocation.
I don’t pretend to have all the answers. But I know this: We are stronger together. Kansas residents should not quietly accept a deal they never voted on. Call your representatives. Speak up about what Arrowhead Stadium means and where your tax dollars are going. Chiefs players and coaches, if you have the courage to stand with your fans, you would be remembered forever.
And to the $25 billion Hunt family: What are we doin’?
Rachel Carpino was born in Mission and grew up in Lee’s Summit. She attended dental school at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.
This story was originally published December 31, 2025 at 5:01 AM.