At least one thing is crystal clear in the murky waters of mile-high stadium’s future: the Broncos’ new owners are preparing to make a roughly $2 billion investment and Denver’s leaders should pull out – almost — all the stops to make sure that investment is in the city.

All we ask in exchange for this substantial public financial assistance is complete transparency (and of course the continuation of the popular lottery system for affordable tickets to Broncos games).

The elected officials in this state and city must be honest about the value of any proposed land deals, tax breaks, taxing authority or no-bid contractsawarded to some of the wealthiest people in America to help their real estate venture.

The Denver Post launched a four-part special report this month: The $tadium Game. The reporting was stellar as our team looked at the past, the present, and the future of Denver’s sports venues. The city has had some highs in terms of iconic destinations, Coors Field, and some performance lows in the same neighborhood, the Rockies.

The Broncos are not just another sports franchise. The team’s story from the fledgling Bears to the Super Bowl-winning Broncos is an integral part of our history. Losing the team’s downtown Denver presence at a time when urban communities are struggling to rebound from the work-from-home transformation would be dire. Post-COVID, bars, restaurants, and retail stores have struggled in Denver.

In an ideal world, the Broncos would stay where they are. Taxpayers built Empower Field at Mile High using a regional sales tax. The stadium is now debt-free and our investment is ripe to pay off over the next six years of the Bronco’s lease. The historic Mile High location is brilliant: serviced by light rail, close to downtown, and Empower Field recently received $100 million in upgrades thanks to the new owners.

But the clear trend among pro-sporting franchise owners is using their own stadium to anchor a development project worth billions.

Whether it’s Stan Kroenke slow-playing development of vacant fields he leases from Commerce City for $1 a year surrounding his Major League Soccer field, or Stan Kroenke revving up to redevelop the parking lots around his National Hockey League and National Basketball Association arena in Denver, we can’t argue with the dollars and cents calculations driving these mega-ventures.

Billionaires owning not only the team and the venue but also the entire neighborhood is simply the path forward for professional sports in America. The place where that type of venture would be the most profitable (i.e. lowest cost and highest profit) is often on cheaper, easier-to-develop land in one of the many lovely suburbs that ring Denver.

That is why The Denver Post editorial board supports using financial incentives to ensure the Broncos’ new stadium — if one must be built — remains in Denver.

Should the Broncos ownership — the Walton-Penner Group — be interested in state-owned land, like the 58 acres at Burnham Yard just west of the Lincoln Park neighborhood, the public needs to know the appraised value of that land upfront.

The Colorado Department of Transportation purchased the land in 2021 for $51 million, which gives us a ballpark value, but property values have grown quite a bit since then.

The same is true for other lands owned nearby like the Denver Water parcel. Denver Water is a government entity that serves its ratepayers, and if the Walton-Penner Group is interested in some of the utilities’ land, accurate appraisals are essential.

When the Raiders were moved from Oakland to Las Vegas, at least there was a record of every single lawmaker who supported and opposed the deal to give the Raiders $750 million in bonds to be paid back with interest using a hotel-room tax.

On top of helping the Broncos’ owners acquire land downtown with favorable terms, the city is likely to give the Broncos owners’ nearly unlimited taxing authority using a quasi-governmental metropolitan district. The Waltons and Penners — led by heirs to the Walmart fortune Greg Penner and Carrie Walton, who also happen to be related to Kroenke — could use a combination of property taxes, hotel taxes, sales taxes and ticket taxes to pay for the debt of the stadium and other infrastructure projects on the land.

While we are generally opposed to metropolitan districts because of how abused they have been by developers, this structure could make sense for a stadium district, if there was enough oversight to prevent abuse.

The beauty of a taxing district is that the people who use the new stadium and the nearby bars, restaurants, and hotels and live in the new condos would pay for it over time. The City of Denver should not approve a metro district on any land being considered for a new stadium unless the developer agrees that the district’s taxes and spending would have adequate oversight.

This new model for a metro district could have taxpayer dollars overseen by officials elected in a city-wide election rather than a faux election where the landowners just elect their employees to the board to do their bidding. Developers can then spend taxpayer dollars with no oversight.

In Nevada the stadium authority is chaired by appointed public officials to provide just such oversight of the $1.3 billion that will be paid back. And when revenue fell short of making the minimum payments on those bonds last year, the people in Clark County were able to track how much of their other tax dollars were used to backfill the debt payment.

Because the Broncos bring so much to this city — culture, excitement, and economic stimulus — Denver must be willing to invest. We want the Walton-Penner Group to make heaps of money. We want another championship parade in Denver. And we want to know exactly what our tax dollars are buying.

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Originally Published: January 8, 2025 at 11:40 AM MST