The city doesn't need to raise the sales tax to fund the stadium. The reality is, the city has the resources to pay for the stadium already baked into the budget. The problem is that there are many in the city who are NOT fans of the team and don't want to see an evil rich billionaire getting any benefit from taxpayer funding. It's silly and shortsighted, but it is what it is. They somehow equate taxpayer funding for a publicly owned stadium with the rich getting richer, and fail to see the overall benefit the city gains from such endeavers, even after witnessing it firsthand over the past nearly 30 years.

These people believe tax dollars strictly allocated for the sports complex will somehow starve people, leave potholes in the streets, and cause our public education system to crumble, when these dollars were never intended to go for that to begin with.

We've had a local bed tax in place for severaly years. As we expand the offerings around the stadium and throughout Jacksonville, those could be utilized fund the costs of the renovations, as they are already being used to pay for stadium and sports complex upkeep in general. Those dollars are bound to increase exponentially with the new 4 Seasons hotel slated to be built along with other hotels along the riverfront. As that area of downtown around the stadium starts to emerge from the dilapidated dirt lot it is currently, the revenue generated from those bed taxes should rise.

The stadium already gets the bulk of those bed tax revenues as it should. That stadium is a major revenue generator for the city beyond just the Jags games. Whoever is negotiating with the team on behalf of the city will know this, and their goal is going to be making sure the Jaguars kick in their fair share for any project there. Khan has already displayed a willingness to do so, and this should not be a complicated or problematic negotiation. He's already heavily invested in the area, and his goal is to make this succeed. He has shown a willingess to work with the city in the past. I don't worry that the am is suddenly going to pull up stakes and look elsewhere. It's a great negotiating tactic to imply such, but at the end of the day, it's just words.

The funding is there to get this done. Nobody wants to see the city lose its crown jewel for international exposure in the Jaguars. Once we land on a final design and dollar amount, I'm sure the rhetoric will amp up, but when the dust settles, a deal will be hammered out. All sides benefit greatly from making sure that happens.

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