(The Center Square) – The Pinellas County Commission asked the Tampa Bay Rays this week if they’re in or out when it comes to a stadium deal.
The letter from board Chairwoman Kathleen Peters gives the Major League Baseball team a Sunday deadline to decide whether the club wants to proceed with a $1.3 billion stadium deal for St. Petersburg reached in July.
Peters said in the letter that it was the team, not the county, that killed the deal.
“Pinellas County has operated in good faith, working toward the stadium deal while balancing the needs of our community after back-to-back hurricanes,” Peters said in the letter. “If the Rays want out of this agreement, it is your right to terminate the contract.
“Clear communication about your intentions will be critical to the next steps in this partnership.”
The letter distributed by the team before the county commission meeting on Nov. 19 said the body’s failure to approve the bonds at its Oct. 29 meeting “ended the ability for a 2028 delivery of the ballpark” and that the Rays can’t absorb the additional costs due to the delay.
The Rays say they have ceased work on the development, which would’ve required about $600 million in taxpayer funds.
County officials didn’t buy that argument.
“This statement is contrary to the terms of the agreement that provide for no specific timeframe for the county’s action on the bonds, but allow for required actions of the Rays PRIOR to the county’s obligation to offer bonds for sale to be accomplished as late as March 31, 2025,” the letter reads in part.
Both the county commission and the St. Petersburg City Council voted last week to delay votes on bonds to finance their part of the stadium, which is to be the anchor of a $6.5 billion development in downtown in the Old Gas Plant District.
The City Council also voted to then approve and then delay about $23 million to repair the roof of the Rays’ present home, Tropicana Field, that was shredded by Category 3 Hurricane Milton. The storm tore 18 out of 24 roof panels from the stadium, which was built in 1990. The stadium requires an estimated $55 million in repairs.
The team will play its games next year at the New York Yankees’ spring training park, George Steinbrenner Field, next season, with 69 of its final 103 games to be on the road.
The Rays will be one of two teams, with the Athletics being the other, to play their games next season at a minor league ballpark. The A’s are set to play in Sacramento’s Sutter Health Park as the team awaits a decision in Las Vegas on a planned stadium to be built there.
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred said the movement of the A’s to Las Vegas for 2028 is “100% full steam ahead” and said that any proposed league expansion would have to wait for the resolution of the stadium situation for both the Rays and the A’s.
