COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A political battle fit for the gridiron is underway in Ohio, where state Republican leaders are clashing over whether to single out the Cleveland Browns for help building a new suburban domed stadium or impose tax hikes to fund stadium upgrades for the Cincinnati Bengals and other teams longer term.

Neither idea is without critics in both parties, who argue that underwriting National Football League stadiums siphons money from the state’s policy priorities, including funding infrastructure and public schools.

The most heated debate centers on a proposal by Haslam Sports Group, which owns the Browns, to relocate from the team’s existing open-air stadium on downtown Cleveland’s lakeshore — where they have played since 1999 — to a new $2.4 billion complex in Brook Park, about 15 miles (24.14 kilometers) south. The team has proposed a private-public partnership to which the state would contribute $600 million.

After the money was approved by the Ohio House last week, commissioners in Hamilton County, home to the Bengals, balked. They moved swiftly to re-up their request for $350 million for Paycor Stadium, where the Bengals’ lease is up June 30, 2026. The ask follows Bengals Executive Vice President Katie Blackburn’s comments at recent NFL meetings in Florida, where she said, “We could, I guess, go wherever we wanted after this year” — while noting negotiations are progressing.

The stadium debate heads to the Ohio Senate after their two-week spring break.

Browns dream big, Cleveland recalls Modell nightmare

Dee and Jimmy Haslam, generous Republican campaign donors, say they want a facility “consistent with other world-class NFL stadiums.” With the addition of a dome, the Browns could host year-round events during northeast Ohio’s severe winters and “catalyze meaningful economic impact” at an adjacent entertainment complex. They point out that eight in 10 home game attendees live outside city limits.

Leaders in Cleveland, where Browns games draw coveted economic activity to downtown and the tourism district along Lake Erie, are livid. The existing $247 million Huntington Bank Field was primarily funded by city and county tax dollars. To many, it’s a symbol of the hard-luck sports town’s commitment to the team it nearly lost when then-owner Art Modell notoriously packed off to Baltimore in 1996.

Modell’s messy exit, also hitched to a stadium dispute, led to a state law that says no owner of an Ohio professional sports team that plays most of its home games at a tax-supported stadium can go elsewhere without an agreement with its host city or unless the host city is given six months’ notice with an opportunity to buy the team.

Democratic Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb and members of the city council have threatened for months to invoke the “Modell Law” to prevent the Browns from leaving their current location, where the lease runs through the 2028 season. The city plans to remake the so-called “North Shore” with an eye toward accessibility, economic development and environmental protection. The team has filed a constitutional challenge to the law, and the city sued it back.

Meanwhile, the clock for allocating dollars toward the project is running down: Lawmakers face a June 30 deadline to finalize the state budget for the next two years.

Governor and House have different funding ideas

Republican Gov. Mike DeWine’s budget proposal called for raising the $600 million by doubling the tax on sports betting companies from 20% to 40%. The idea was to create a long-term revenue stream that could help both the Browns and the Bengals, and other teams.

“The governor’s plan goes beyond one team,” DeWine spokesman Dan Tierney said. “The general revenue fund can’t afford that. Therefore, we need to look at something that is more sustainable and can help all the teams.”

The GOP-led Ohio House, however, rejected DeWine’s plan in a vote last week. Its version of the operating budget calls for issuing $600 million in general obligation bonds to pay for the Browns project instead. Paying off the bonds would cost the state about $1 billion over 30 years.

House Finance Chairman Brian Stewart told reporters that the “metrics” of bonds are better for Ohio taxpayers because officials project that tax revenue from the Browns’ “megaproject” will be ample to cover the $40 million a year it will take to repay the bonds.

Senate must work through the opposition

As the Senate takes up the bill, it must weigh opposition to the current plan from all quarters: DeWine, the city of Cleveland, the Bengals, legislative Democrats and Republican Attorney General Dave Yost, who is running to succeed DeWine next year.

“Ohio is getting ready to spend more money on a new stadium in one city for one football team than it will spend on new highway construction for the next two years in the entire state,” Yost wrote in a recent Columbus Dispatch op-ed. He called state money for the project a “spendthrift gift to a billionaire.”

House Democrats unsuccessfully fought to pause the funding proposal altogether, citing unanswered questions about revenue projections, economic impacts and commitments by private developers. Cleveland Rep. Terrence Upchurch told reporters that lawmakers have more important priorities than helping the Browns’ owners, “especially since they only won three (expletive) games last year,” referring to the team’s 3-14 record.

A fellow Democrat in the Republican-supermajority Senate has proposed prohibiting public dollars from going to any professional sports franchise without a winning record in three of its five past seasons.

___

AP Sports Writer Joe Reedy in Cleveland contributed to this report.

Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

CLEVELAND, Ohio (WOIO) – A 19-year-old man was shot and killed on East 55th near Cobleigh Court at around 7:10 p.m. Friday has been identified as Jauquim Torres.

Torres was walking home to celebrate his birthday on April 11 when he was shot and left to die on a sidewalk. Cleveland EMS tells 19 News Torres was pronounced dead at the scene.

On Sunday, his family and close friends gathered at a memorial set up in the spot where he took his last breath.

Torres’s sister, Jamie Hloska, was distraught, angry, and determined to get justice. She used paint to write on the sidewalk the words, ‘You still matter.’

“They robbed him of his life. He can’t be the father to his child. All he had to do was graduate and become a father. He didn’t get to meet his child,” Hloska said.

At just 19 years old, Torres of Cleveland had his entire life ahead of him. Now his loved ones say instead of celebrating his birthday, they are forced to plan his funeral.

His grandmother, Edith Ellis, through tear-filled eyes said he was her heart.

“Oh, he was so excited about his child, so excited. He was also excited about graduating and walking across the stage to receive his diploma next month,” said Ellis. “Now there’s no graduation, and he’ll never see his child. For what? There’s no reason.”

For Daniela Jones, the mother of his child, who is five-and-a-half months pregnant, this is a nightmare she can’t wake up from. What she was looking forward to has been taken away.

“Getting the chance to see him be a father is what I will miss most,” said Jones. “He was so excited about it. It’s not something planned. He had already picked a name before we knew the gender.”

Family and friends gathered around the memorial of candles and balloons to hold hands and pray.

“Father God, we ask you to give us justice. We ask you to give him peace,” they said.

Through their tears and long embraces, loved ones are demanding justice for Torres.

“I have to put my brother in the ground,” said Hloska.

The Cleveland man’s loved ones, including his sister, told 19 News they believe the killer is someone Juaquim Torres knew and trusted.

“He did what he was supposed to — he didn’t deserve this,” said Hloska.

Torres, according to his grandmother, was someone who absolutely loved his family, and ironically, it’s his death that has finally brought them all together.

“I’ve tried for years to get them together. They won’t even talk to each other, half of them. It took my grandson’s death to bring this family together. Everybody loved him, so everybody pulled together,” Ellis said.

The victim’s family has set up a GoFundMe account, hoping to raise enough money to give Torres a proper funeral and burial.

They are hoping police detectives can provide them with some answers about what led up to the deadly shooting.

At this point, no arrests have been made.

19 News has reached out to Cleveland Police for more information, but we have not yet heard back.

Copyright 2025 WOIO. All rights reserved.

With the 2025 NFL Draft just around the corner, the Kansas City Chiefs as a franchise have bounced back through storng draft selections across each round of the draft. Going into this year’s draft, the Chiefs have been heavily predicted to lean toward adding more depth to the offensive line.

That being said, let’s take a flash back to the past. While the Chiefs have done well in recent years of the draft, they weren’t always successful in their selections. According to a new article published by Sports Illustrated’s Matt Verderame, one former first round draft selection found himself as the biggest draft bust in Chiefs history.

The former first round draft selection in question for the Chiefs that found his name attached with the article is quarterback Todd Blackledge. Blackledge was taken by the franchise seventh overall in the 1983 NFL Draft, but his time as a Chief did not go according to plan for the front office.

“Blackledge was part of the famed 1983 draft in which six quarterbacks were selected in the first round including Hall of Famers John Elway, Dan Marino and Jim Kelly. Unfortunately for the Chiefs, Blackledge was the worst of them. He started 24 games across five seasons for what was, at the time, a rudderless organization. The Chiefs didn’t take another quarterback in the first round until Patrick Mahomes in 2017,” Verderame wrote.

As the Chiefs quarterback, between 1983 to 1987, Blackledge threw for 4,510 passing yards, averaging 902 passing yards per season. He also held a completion rate of 49.1%, as he was only able to secure the team 26 touchdowns in five seasons and got picked off 32 times.

As Verderame stated, the Chiefs waited over three decades before taking a quarterback in the first round, but luckily for the franchise this time around, they struck gold with Mahomes.

While Blackledge’s career didn’t go so well as a Chief, at least he will always be able to say that he was once good enough to be regarded as a Top 10 draft pick in the National Football League; and that is something that no one will ever be able to take away from him.

Check us out on X (Twitter) @KCChiefsOnSI and @Domminchella to never miss another breaking news story again.

Click here to let us know your thoughts when you like our Facebook page WHEN YOU CLICK RIGHT HERE.