Jackson County refinances Truman Sports Complex bonds

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File | KCBJ

Truman Sports Complex in Kansas City, includes Arrowhead Stadium (left) and Kauffman Stadium.

James Dornbrook

Reporter- Kansas City Business Journal

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Jackson County will sell about $340 million in bonds Wednesday in order to refinance some of the debt from the 2006 renovation of Kauffman and Arrowhead stadiums.

The move will save about $32 million in interest costs, however, that savings won't go into the county coffers. It will go into a maintenance fund for the stadiums, boosting that fund even further than originally expected. The reason the savings go there is because the bonds are financed by a three-eighths-cent sales tax for stadium improvements. Besides the county, the stadium maintenance fund also receives contributions from Kansas City and the state of Missouri.

The original funding was completed using 25-year bonds, which is the same period of time the sales tax runs and the length of the current lease with the teams, from 2006 to 2031. The new bonds will also be issues for that same time frame.

Jackson County owns the stadiums and leases them to the Kansas City Royals and Kansas City Chiefs. The Jackson County Sports Complex Authority, which has an independent board selected by both county and state government officials, oversees operations of the stadiums.

The refinancing has no effect on the lease between the county and the teams.

Jackson County had originally planned to refinance the bonds in mid-September, but in monitoring the market, decided to wait a bit longer. That decision turned out to be a wise one, considering rates dropped since then, enough to save about $9 million.

"We're proud to be able to save the taxpayers millions of dollars," Jackson County Executive Mike Sanders said in a release. "This will ensure that we can properly maintain these taxpayer assets and give our teams the support they need to remain competitive."

James reports about banking, financial services, manufacturing and sports business.