There’s a chance it could still happen. I live in Kansas City and voted No. While spending public money on a private endeavor was certainly a big issue, I think a lot of people were more POed with the way the teams and county/city went about this. There were almost no concrete plans on remaining sources of funding, potential traffic/parking/public transit issues, if the affected businesses in the proposed district would even sell off their land and properties, and more. Plus the fact that the selected location seemingly appeared out of nowhere. For months, there were two other locations – one of which is literally almost entirely parking lots and empty space – that were being talked about. And of course the implicit threats of leaving if the vote failed. There was also the rushed vote. There’s no reason this had to be voted on this instant. This could’ve wait until the November election. People rightfully saw this was a bad way to go about this.

I think if the teams and city/county go back to the drawing board, change the location, come up with more concrete plans, lessen the amount of public money going in (like maybe not have a 40yr tax), get the teams to agree to stay the whole term – the teams weren’t even guaranteed to stay the whole term of the tax – and just in general make it more appealing to people (the Chiefs were going to use their cut of the money to improve/build out more premium suites that average people will never see/use), people might be willing to vote for it. It’d still be a close call, but I could see people saying Yes if everything lined up.

Another option is for the teams to go across the state line to Kansas. Which I’d have no problem with that. If Kansans want to pay, let them. It’s their money, not mine at that point.