New: Latest on Kroenke, Rams and NFL in STL

[dieterbrock]

Why does the MLS need St louis to build a stadium to host a team?? What's wrong with playing at the new Busch?
The New York team plays at Yankee Stadium

 

[blue4]

St. Louis should pause before getting burned again

http://www.stltoday.com/news/opinio...cle_1d9f8b9e-e569-5962-8a78-ffe78243244a.html

Build it, and we might come. That is the message the NFL has delivered to our community. Here’s why we should pause before making that leap of faith.

Fact: The lease that St. Louis gave the Rams when the dome was first built was a bad deal for the city. Twenty years in, with the city still owing over $100 million in debt on the dome’s construction, the Rams are free to walk away.

Fact: The reason the city struck such a bad deal with the Rams is because in 1994, with a new stadium and no tenant, it was the best deal to be made.

Fact: The dome is no longer a viable home for an NFL franchise, because the NFL says so.

Fact: The NFL has made no guarantee to anyone that should St. Louis build a new stadium, it would have an NFL tenant.

Fact: A surplus of NFL-worthy stadiums gives NFL owners leverage in renegotiating leases or negotiating construction of new stadiums in their (current) cities.

Fact: With that leverage, it is more likely that the NFL could extract from a current owner the $1 billion franchise relocation fee. It is also more likely that the NFL could entice more billionaires to join the NFL owners club by paying the $1 billion-plus franchise fee for expansion teams, because cities with empty stadiums give more favorable lease terms.

Question: Why would St. Louis, having been burned once, surrender all leverage and again deal itself a losing hand by building a stadium without either a guaranteed NFL tenant or a palatable lease in hand?

Will Bealke • Des Peres

Will Bealke from Des Peres, the new Captain Obvious. I don't think anyone is calling for a new stadium without the Rams without some strong assurance that an NFL team would play here. But I almost would still rather gamble on a new team (barring the Rams staying of course) and build the thing anyway, even if the lease is unfavorable. It's still better than the creeping blight that that area is currently. Maybe between that and ballpark village we'd have a good start to revitalizing downtown.

 

[Boffo97]

Fact: The lease that St. Louis gave the Rams when the dome was first built was a bad deal for the city. Twenty years in, with the city still owing over $100 million in debt on the dome’s construction, the Rams are free to walk away.

Technically, it was even worse than that. The Rams could have walked in 2005 had they had the ability/desire to do so.

That's one thing that really makes me feel for my St. Louis brothers... that lease was outright crappy for St. Louis.

 

[ChrisW]

Why does the MLS need St louis to build a stadium to host a team?? What's wrong with playing at the new Busch?
The New York team plays at Yankee Stadium

A new open-aired FB stadium would give the seating to hold big name games such as Gold Cups (which are held every two years), Copa America games, and possibly World Cup games. On top of that, no MLS team will come here if they have to play in the baseball stadium, and I'm pretty sure scheduling would be impossible during the summer.

 

[dbrooks25]

I will bear that in mind when it comes to the St. Louis American in the future, thanks.

Yeah, they are a free newsapaper over her that caters to the African American community. Not that that part matters, just letting you know their background. It is a good newspaper, it's just that they can be pretty negative when it comes to the Rams. They even right negative stuff here and there about the Cardinals.

 

[dieterbrock]

A new open-aired FB stadium would give the seating to hold big name games such as Gold Cups (which are held every two years), Copa America games, and possibly World Cup games. On top of that, no MLS team will come here if they have to play in the baseball stadium, and I'm pretty sure scheduling would be impossible during the summer.

Most of the other MLS teams play in soccer only stadiums that seat 20-30k. The largest attended sporting event at the new Busch was a soccer match hosting 48k. Scheduling at Yankee stadium works just fine, I dont see why an MLS team wouldnt want to play in a baseball stadium. People buy MLS merchandise at Yankee games.
I hear you on the Gold Cup, but by the same respect throwing a retractable roof opens it to a Superbowl.
All I'm saying is that I love soccer, and would love to see it played in St louis. That said, I dont think needing a new football stadium should be the drawback in getting a franchise.

 

[ChrisW]

Most of the other MLS teams play in soccer only stadiums that seat 20-30k. The largest attended sporting event at the new Busch was a soccer match hosting 48k. Scheduling at Yankee stadium works just fine, I dont see why an MLS team wouldnt want to play in a baseball stadium. People buy MLS merchandise at Yankee games.
I hear you on the Gold Cup, but by the same respect throwing a retractable roof opens it to a Superbowl.
All I'm saying is that I love soccer, and would love to see it played in St louis. That said, I dont think needing a new football stadium should be the drawback in getting a franchise.

Which MLS team plays at Yankee Stadium? I know that most MLS teams play in their own stadiums, but that's because the league doesn't want to be a leasee in someone else's building. But, if they make the exception here and STL gets an MLS team and keeps the Rams, isn't that a win-win?

 

[dieterbrock]

Which MLS team plays at Yankee Stadium? I know that most MLS teams play in their own stadiums, but that's because the league doesn't want to be a leasee in someone else's building. But, if they make the exception here and STL gets an MLS team and keeps the Rams, isn't that a win-win?

New York City Football Club play at Yankee Stadium. And its awesome. Being a smaller stadium, you are right on top of the action. Ive seen soccer at the old Giants Stadium and unless you had great seast, you would be far away from some of the action.
All I'm saying is that St Louis shouldnt need a new football stadium to get a MLS team. If they build a new stadium, thats great. But it shouldnt be the deal breaker. Seems mutually exclusive to me.
As for the rest of the MLS, IMO they play in smaller stadiums to ensure they are playing in front of packed audience. New York Red Bulls have there own stadium, and capacity is like 30k. And man, its louder than a Giants game with 80k

 

[ChrisW]

New York City Football Club play at Yankee Stadium. And its awesome. Being a smaller stadium, you are right on top of the action. Ive seen soccer at the old Giants Stadium and unless you had great seast, you would be far away from some of the action.
All I'm saying is that St Louis shouldnt need a new football stadium to get a MLS team. If they build a new stadium, thats great. But it shouldnt be the deal breaker. Seems mutually exclusive to me.
As for the rest of the MLS, IMO they play in smaller stadiums to ensure they are playing in front of packed audience. New York Red Bulls have there own stadium, and capacity is like 30k. And man, its louder than a Giants game with 80k

I get what you're saying, and it does sound like fun. How do we know that the Cardinals want anyone else to use the stadium with the frequency the MLS would? Maybe the international friendlies are OK, because they are few and far between.

Question: How do they handle the infield at soccer games? Surely they don't leave the dirt base paths on the field.

I still think a new open aired stadium with both sports in mind would be the better option going forward. And if MLS helps the Rams get funding to stay in STL.....all the better.

 

[dieterbrock]

I get what you're saying, and it does sound like fun. How do we know that the Cardinals want anyone else to use the stadium with the frequency the MLS would? Maybe the international friendlies are OK, because they are few and far between.

Question: How do they handle the infield at soccer games? Surely they don't leave the dirt base paths on the field.

I still think a new open aired stadium with both sports in mind would be the better option going forward. And if MLS helps the Rams get funding to stay in STL.....all the better.

They play 17 home games over 6 month period. Can be easily configured around baseball season. Basically 1 home game every 2 weeks.
They only cover about 2/3 of the infield. Its pretty wild
Again, I'm getting caught here in a Rams discussion where my purpose is more about soccer. I'd love St Louis to get a team, it really is an awesome sport/league

 

[TSFH Fan]

Historical perspective piece. New Yorker Neil deMause "is co-author with Joanna Cagan on the 1999 book Field of Schemes: How the Great Stadium Swindle Turns Public Money into Private Profit." (Wikipedia)

Includes this: "ignore what the owners and the league are saying: It's their job to create leverage, so in most cases they'll be sure to leave the door open at least a crack for a move threat, whether they have any intention of going through with it or not."

https://sports.vice.com/article/how-to-tell-if-your-team-is-about-to-leave-you-forever


January 20, 2015 | 5:50 AM
Neil deMause

How to Tell If Your Team Is About to Leave You Forever

If it seems to you like we've hit Peak Sports Team Move Threat lately, you're not alone. In the last few weeks there's been talk of the St. Louis Rams going to L.A., the Oakland Raiders to L.A. or maybe San Antonio, the San Diego Chargers to (wait for it) L.A. or who knows where, the Milwaukee Bucks (or is it the Atlanta Hawks?) to Seattle, and the Tampa Bay Rays to Montreal. And then there's hockey, where fans of pretty much any team shouldn't be surprised to wake up to rumors of their teams moving to Quebec, or Seattle, or Las Vegas, or one of those ice floes with a polar bear on it.


The problem, for sports fans wondering when it's appropriate to freak the hell out, is knowing which of these rumors are true. Teams do move, obviously--there have been six franchise relocations in the Big Four sports leagues since 2000--and franchise moves to new cities averaged just under one per year during the latter half of the 20th century. Ask a still-distraught Brooklyn Dodgers fan, or Baltimore Colts fan, or California Golden Seals fan (there have to be one or two), and they'll tell you that when sports owners start pricing moving vans, it isn't always a bluff.

Except, of course, when it is. For team owners angling for a new stadium, or a new lease, or even just a new owner willing to pay a premium to keep the team in town, the move threat is a standard part of the playbook, whether they're serious or not.

The committee to keep the Raiders in Oakland. Photo by Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

Move threats as a gambit--or what we might call "lying"--is a relatively recent phenomenon. Back in the early days of team sports, teams would generally move only when they either were going broke in their old homes, or occasionally when an out-of-town owner would buy a team because he wanted one for his city. (My all-time personal favorite remains when the fledgling American Basketball Association hired former Minneapolis Lakers star George Mikan as commissioner, and he insisted on putting the league office in Minneapolis. When the city's hastily assembled original franchise flopped, the league picked up the champion Pittsburgh Pipers and sent them to Minneapolis as a replacement.)

The shift of population to the West and South, and particularly the advent of fast, reliable jet travel between those cities, led to a bevy of moves (12 teams relocated between 1954 and 1963, though the leagues were much smaller then), but after that things settled into occasional relocations of marginal teams: the California Golden Seals becoming the Cleveland Barons, the Buffalo Braves becoming the San Diego Clippers, the Seattle Pilots being bought by some former car salesman after just one year in existence and rechristened as the Milwaukee Brewers.

The idea that you could make money not by moving a team, but by merely threatening to, didn't take hold until the 1980s, after owners realized that it was a great way of terrifying elected officials into passing stadium funding bills, stat. Since then, far more teams have threatened moves than have gone through with them, particularly when a target city has popped up that could serve as bogeyman for multiple teams at once: Tampa Bay and then Washington in baseball, L.A. for the NFL, most recently Seattle for the NBA, Kansas City and Quebec for the NHL. It's become such a standard play that Penguins owner Mario Lemieux could think nothing of saying, after years of dropping hints that the Penguins would move to Kansas City without a new arena, "Those trips to Kansas City and Vegas and other cities was just to go, and have a nice dinner and come back... That was just a way for us to put more pressure, and we knew it would work at the end of the day."

That didn't work out so well. Image via WikiMedia Commons


In fact, teams that have actually gone through with moves in recent years have fallen into one of just a few categories:

1) Seeking a Better Market: There aren't that many of these, mostly because sports leagues do such a good job of filling in all the lucrative markets that there are seldom good ones up for grabs. The New Jersey Nets moving to Brooklyn arguably qualifies (okayed by Knicks owner James Dolan in one of his most boneheaded moves that didn't involve Isiah Thomas), and I suppose you could consider the Montreal Expos going to Washington, D.C. as well, though the ongoing battle with the Baltimore Orioles over cable rights shows that D.C. wasn't such a slam dunk as markets go.


2) Offered a Better Deal: Most of the relocations of the modern era, the most infamous ones in particular, were prompted by some other city dangling a new building with a sweetheart lease. Colts defecting to Indianapolis? The city was offering the brand-new Hoosier Dome as move-in ready. Cleveland Browns decamping to replace the Colts? Hello, M&T Bank Stadium, paid for by Maryland lottery ticket buyers. The Rams' presence in St. Louis is probably the best example of this, since the city was so desperate for a team to replace the Cardinals that it agreed to a lease that let the team's owner break it if at any point the Edward Jones Dome wasn't kept "state of the art"--leading to the prospect of the city having to go shopping for yet another new team just 20 years after landing its last one.

3) League Machinations: This one is mostly on the NHL, which shifted a bunch of teams to places like Arizona and North Carolina as part of commissioner Gary Bettman's plan to conquer the South. The Expos could qualify here, too, given that they met their maker largely because of Bud Selig's desire to get his pal John Henry a better team than the Marlins.

4) Personal Plaything: Clay Bennett buying the Seattle Sonics and transmogrifying them into the Oklahoma City Thunder so he could have a team in his hometown is the archetypal example here, though he was aided by the fact that Oklahoma City was offering a new arena for free and Seattle was asking the NBA to live with an arena that hadn't been renovated in 14 years.

The bluffers, meanwhile, mostly should have been obvious from the start. Teams almost never, for example, moved from bigger markets to much smaller markets: the Oakland A's didn't move to Sacramento, the New York Islanders didn't move to Quebec, and the rumors that George Steinbrenner was thinking of moving the Yankees to Charlotte could have been dismissed simply by looking at the size of the two cable markets. Aside from Bennett picking up the Sonics and going home with them, the obvious exceptions--the Oilers' move from Houston to Tennessee, and the Rams from L.A. to St. Louis--were in the NFL, where thanks to the ubiquity of national TV contracts, local revenue is a minor part of teams' bottom lines.

So what does that mean for fans of the Rams, or the Bucks, or any other team currently facing scare headlines about an imminent departure? First off, ignore what the owners and the league are saying: It's their job to create leverage, so in most cases they'll be sure to leave the door open at least a crack for a move threat, whether they have any intention of going through with it or not. (You can write off, in particular, just about anything that comes out of the mouth of the exquisitely named NFL VP Eric Grubman.) And take "market size" with a grain of salt: L.A. may be a wonderful place to live, and an even more wonderful place to own a baseball or basketball team, but when it comes to football, with a good enough stadium deal you could play in Ouagadougou--or Green Bay--and turn a decent profit, so long as those checks from Fox, CBS, NBC, and ESPN kept rolling in.

If I were a Bucks fan, meanwhile, I'd be at least the slightest bit antsy, given that Milwaukee is the NBA's fourth-smallest TV market (ahead of only New Orleans, Oklahoma City, and San Antonio, though it's worth noting that none of those teams are considered a likely move threat), meaning the Bucks' new owners would see their TV customers potentially double with a move to, say, Seattle. Still, there's a lot to be said for a fan base that you know over a pig in a poke--which is one reason why no team in recent memory has moved when there was even a hint that public subsidies might be available in their current hometown.

Finally, when considering over-exuberant talk about vacant cities seeking teams--Louisville has as many corporate headquarters per capita as St. Louis! If San Antonio and Austin were one city, they'd be as big as Denver!--it's also important to remember that there's a reason why they're vacant in the first place. Like the old joke about the economist goes, "That can't be a $10 bill lying in the street, or someone would have picked it up by now." There's always a chance that, say, L.A. will mean free money to some NFL team eventually--but if it were such a sure thing, would that free money really have been lying there this long?

 

[ChrisW]

They play 17 home games over 6 month period. Can be easily configured around baseball season. Basically 1 home game every 2 weeks.
They only cover about 2/3 of the infield. Its pretty wild
Again, I'm getting caught here in a Rams discussion where my purpose is more about soccer. I'd love St Louis to get a team, it really is an awesome sport/league

That's more room for corners than I've seen in some football stadiums.

 

[RamFan503]

Again, I'm getting caught here in a Rams discussion where my purpose is more about soccer. I'd love St Louis to get a team,

I dunno. It's also a thread about the stadium issues so it seems to fit. If soccer is something that is potentially part of a stadium deal, it is good information.

 

[tonyl711]

for one thing, in order for a stadium to be built NFL dollars are involved, about 400 million. I would say that if the NFL gives up 400 million they wont do it just to gift us a stadium, if their money helps build it an NFL team would play there.

 

[Alan]

"Fact: The lease that St. Louis gave the Rams when the dome was first built was a bad deal for the city. Twenty years in, with the city still owing over $100 million in debt on the dome’s construction, the Rams are free to walk away."

This is factually incorrect. Had the city kept its part of the bargain (renovating it periodically to keep it among the best) the Rams would not be "free to walk away."

The writer is from NY so his ignorance of the facts is understandable but I'm a little offended that he used the word "fact" in it.

 

[blue4]

"Fact: The lease that St. Louis gave the Rams when the dome was first built was a bad deal for the city. Twenty years in, with the city still owing over $100 million in debt on the dome’s construction, the Rams are free to walk away."

This is factually incorrect. Had the city kept its part of the bargain (renovating it periodically to keep it among the best) the Rams would not be "free to walk away."

The writer is from NY so his ignorance of the facts is understandable but I'm a little offended that he used the word "fact" in it.

I'm not sure any amount of renovations would keep the EJD in the top 25%.

 

[Alan]

blue4 thinking they lost before they started:
I'm not sure any amount of renovations would keep the EJD in the top 25%.

Maybe. They didn't even make an effort. Couldn't get the money to upgrade it to be approved.

Although, looked at from another angle, the fact that they probably knew they wouldn't be able to do what was necessary makes it even more of a bad deal by them.

 

[RamBill]

Bernie: St. Louis gets an unfair rap for NFL support
• By Bernie Miklasz

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/colu...cle_dc5c1c65-3c97-506f-8b1a-2696c86d9584.html

Please pardon me as I climb atop the soapbox again, but I needed to vent on something.

One of the things that continues to bother me is the perception of St. Louis failing to support the Rams.

This applies to the criticism that St. Louis waited too long to conceive plans for a new stadium. That's ludicrous on every level — but especially preposterous when you consider Los Angeles.

And I cite Los Angeles because that's where Rams owner Stan Kroenke is planning to build a new stadium. And if he can pull that off — which is uncertain — then Kroenke almost certainly will try to move the Rams there ... perhaps by 2016. But his project must clear some significant hurdles before it becomes a reality.

But this got me to thinking again ...

How in the heck can anyone criticize St. Louis for being too slow to organize a new-stadium initiative when LA has gone literally decades without turning dirt on an NFL-specific football venue?

If football is so important in Los Angeles, why has it taken so long to erect a new stadium?

Consider:

The Rose Bowl in Pasadena opened in 1922.

The Los Angeles Coliseum opened in 1923.

Anaheim Stadium opened in 1966 — for the baseball Angels.

The Rams moved from the Coliseum to Anaheim in 1980 and shared the venue with the Angels from 1980 through their final season (1994) in the Los Angeles area.

Granted, the Rose Bowl is a beautiful setting but it hasn't been utilized as a regular home for an NFL franchise. And won't be unless it's on a temporary basis.

That's why it's so strange to hear simple minds yapping about St. Louis being so pokey to get going on a new stadium.

If the Dave Peacock and Bob Blitz stadium plan gets off the ground, it would be the second new NFL stadium constructed and opened for an NFL team in our town since 1995.

If St. Louis has allegedly moved at such a plodding pace — then why isn't anyone talking about the Los Angeles failure to get anything done on the stadium front during the many decades that have rolled by?

I'm also wondering why so many seemingly expect Los Angeles to support the Rams — at least after the initial novelty wears off — should the team move there.

The Rams' attendance in St. Louis has dropped over the past several seasons, which is understandable given the circumstances that include: (A) the team's terrible 49-110-1 record since last making the playoffs in the 2004 season; (B) an aloof owner who refuses to engage the fans; (C) an owner who is angling to move the franchise; (D) and having home games played in a facility that the Rams deem inadequate and below NFL standards.

Gee, I wonder why attendance would go from having a long string of home sellouts to an average of 57,000 per game?

And by the way: why does St. Louis have to apologize for still drawing 57,000 per game for a franchise that hasn't had a winning season since 2003?

At some point the team — not the fans — should be held accountable for lower attendance.

Los Angeles was the same way with the Rams during the team's final seasons in Anaheim. Between 1990 and 1994, the Rams went 23-57. That win total was tied with Cincinnati for the fewest in the NFL over the five-season stretch.

After making the playoffs for the fifth time in six seasons in 1989, the Rams drew well in 1990. But the crowds went into decline after that.

Here's where the Rams ranked in home attendance among the 28 NFL franchises from 1991 through 1994. (Carolina and Jacksonville didn't enter the NFL as expansion teams until 1995, and the Houston Texans and "new" Cleveland Browns were added via expansion later bringing league membership to 32 teams.)

The Rams were 22nd among 28 teams in 1991 ...

They were 25th in 1992...

They were 25th in 1993 ...

They were 28th — last — among the 28 teams in 1994.

And with LA, we're talking about the second-largest population center of any NFL market.

I don't blame LA Rams fans for being ticked off and staying away. The LA fans were dealing with a set of circumstances similar to what we've seen in St. Louis for too long: awful football, an unpopular owner, a below-average stadium, and endless speculation of the team's owner looking to move.

The support fell off for the Rams in Los Angeles, just as it eroded here.

(Eroded, yes. But it hasn't collapsed.)

When both markets were hit with the same combination of factors — a chronic loser for a team, a vilified owner, the unattractive stadium, the nonstop relocation rumors — LA and St. Louis largely responded the same way. Fewer tickets were sold.

There are several differences, of course. We've already mentioned one: the huge difference in population in comparing Los Angeles to St. Louis.

The second: St. Louis has stepped up once on the stadium front, and is trying to do it again.

Here's the third: the Rams' attendance in Anaheim plunged rather quickly after a sustained run of success. That didn't happen here. The drop in home attendance has been more gradual. It wasn't a sudden free fall.

And fourth: even during some winning seasons the LA Rams' home attendance was ordinary at best.

Again, the NFL had 28 teams at the time. And between 1973 and 1989, the Rams made the playoffs 14 times in 17 seasons and competed in more postseason games (24) than any other NFL team.

Despite the consistently good results on the field, it took the LA Rams only one bad season (1990) before the attendance began to slide in '91.

And here's where the LA Rams ranked among the 28 NFL teams in home attendance during some of their playoff-bound seasons:

14th in 1978 ...

17th in 1979 ...

15th in 1983 ...

17th in 1984 ...

15th in 1985 ...

18th in 1987...

Unlike the Rams in Los Angeles, the St. Louis Rams haven't provided an extensive run of success for their fans here. Sure, 1999 through 2003 was a special time, but all too brief.

The Rams have been here for 20 seasons, and have posted only four winning records and five playoff seasons.

As an NFL city, St. Louis has enjoyed only 16 winning records and eight playoff teams in 48 seasons, Cardinals and Rams combined.

Rams fans in St. Louis weren't as quick to bail out as Rams fans in LA.

But for some reason, this town's support for mostly bad football is under fire — even though attendance here held up better than the attendance in Los Angeles when the team began to lose there.

And even as we're trying to build a second new football stadium in St. Louis since 1995, at a time when Los Angeles hasn't built a new stadium since the 1920s. Unless you want to count the stadium built for baseball's Angels in the mid-1960s.

And Los Angeles is viewed as the new promised land?

Of course, we understand the real reason for LA's luster and it has nothing to do with fan support. LA is an immense market, and the Rams' franchise value would take a monumental jump if the NFL allows Kroenke to cut and run and move his team there.

But as for fan support, I'll close with my favorite stat on attendance and I'll bold-face the pertinent number to reinforce the point:

In 1984 the LA Rams went 10-6, made the playoffs, and had future Hall of Famer Eric Dickerson rushing for an NFL record 2,105 yards and 14 touchdowns.

The '84 Rams averaged 54,455 per home game that season.

In 2014 the Rams posted their 11th consecutive non-winning season with the owner plotting to haul the team away.

The '14 Rams averaged 57,018 per home game.

Even in the worst of times, STL fans have done a decent job of hanging tough in the pocket. And when St. Louis has been given a good on-field product to support, the fans have gone wild for NFL football.

Our town lost an NFL franchise when the Cardinals moved to Arizona. But Los Angeles has lost two NFL franchises.

Thanks for reading ...

— Bernie

 

[bluecoconuts]

Bernies article can be responded to with a single sentence. The LA market is completely different today than it was just 20 years ago. He might as well compare St Louis's situation with Nepal, it's apples or oranges at this point. If it was the same then the NFL wouldn't be so interested in returning.

 

[Boffo97]

Bernies article can be responded to with a single sentence. The LA market is completely different today than it was just 20 years ago. He might as well compare St Louis's situation with Nepal, it's apples or oranges at this point. If it was the same then the NFL wouldn't be so interested in returning.

Exactly. It's been different people involved in L.A., and there hasn't been any contract hanging over their heads.

Whereas in St. Louis, the CVC knew from signing the lease that the first tier clause was going to be a problem, and as of two more weeks, it will be two full years since the CVC rejected the Rams' arbitrator-approved proposal for bringing the EJD into compliance with the lease.

At the very least, St. Louis should have hit the ground running after that rejection with an alternate plan. They didn't, and that's why people are wondering if there's any sense of urgency from them. Comparisons to other cities aren't going to help that perception.