The Oakland A’s Plan to Relocate to Las Vegas Is Taking Shape!
https://www.wsj.com/sports/baseball/oakland-mlb-las-vegas-ab43007a
When the Oakland A’s in April abruptly announced their intention to relocate to Las Vegas, a few important details had not quite been nailed down—like how exactly to build a new ballpark in the gambling capital.
A few weeks later, however, the team’s plan to relocate after more than 50 years at the now-decrepit Oakland Coliseum is starting to take shape. The process is moving quickly enough that the deal could be up for approval by Major League Baseball owners in mid-June.
That, however, depends on whether a deal to finance a stadium clears the Nevada legislature. A bill introduced in the state legislature last Friday would provide up to $380 million in public funding for a ballpark on the Las Vegas Strip, on the site of the Tropicana Las Vegas hotel. The A’s would be responsible for “not less than $1.1 billion” in other costs associated with the development of the ballpark, the bill states.
This legislation represents an important concrete step in the A’s plan to leave Oakland. The Nevada scheduled legislative session ends on June 5, and the bill was heard in a joint session of the Senate Committee on Finance and the Assembly Committee on Ways and Means on Monday.
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MLB owners are scheduled to meet June 13 to 15 at MLB headquarters in New York, and a vote on the A’s relocation—and potentially waiving a relocation fee—could take place then.
The Las Vegas proposal calls for a 30,000 seat stadium—by far the smallest in the majors—that would be owned by the Clark County Stadium Authority and would be expected to open in 2028. The A’s existing lease with the Coliseum in Oakland is currently set to expire after the 2024 season, which means the team would either need to attempt to extend their time in the city they’re leaving or play at an alternative location until a Las Vegas ballpark is completed.
The A’s may not find themselves welcome to stay in Oakland for longer than necessary. They entered Wednesday with a record of 11-45 and have been playing home games in front of fewer than 3,000 fans at times.
Fans have called for team owner John Fisher to sell the team, hoping that a change in ownership could keep it in the Bay Area. The A’s spent decades exploring potential options for a new stadium in Oakland or the surrounding areas, but abruptly announced in April that the team had turned its focus to a future in Las Vegas. The City of Oakland said at the time that it had been actively negotiating with the A’s on ballpark options when they learned through a media report that the A’s had agreed to buy a site in Las Vegas.
The current ballpark deal in Las Vegas isn’t the one the A’s initially envisioned. An earlier agreement to purchase a different site in Las Vegas fell through, leading the A’s to find another landing spot on Las Vegas Boulevard. The Tropicana would be demolished to create a 9-acre footprint for the A’s ballpark.
According to the legislation, the A’s would agree to a 30-year “non-relocation agreement” with the stadium authority to secure the financing for the ballpark site. The bill proposes raising the funds through existing tax revenue streams, rather than creating new taxes on Nevada residents. Additionally, the stadium authority will be exempt from paying property taxes on the site.
The A’s would become the fourth professional sports team to operate in Las Vegas, and the second team from Oakland to move to the tourist town. The bill to finance a new ballpark draws language the legislature used to build a stadium for the Raiders when they, too, relocated from Oakland.
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