St. Pete Chamber endorses Hines and Tampa Bay Rays proposal to redevelop Tropicana Field
By Breanne Williams
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Jan 12, 2023

The St. Petersburg Area Chamber of Commerce has endorsed the Hines and Tampa Bay Rays proposal to redevelop the Historic Gas Plant District.

The Chamber announced its endorsement Thursday afternoon in a Tampa Bay Times op-ed.

Chris Steinocher, CEO of the Chamber, told the Business Journal the Chamber has been invested in this project since 2008 when the Rays first said they wanted a new stadium.

Since that initial discussion, the Chamber has supported keeping the Rays in St. Pete, including during the last RFP process under former Mayor Rick Kriseman, he said.

“We were supportive of the split season in Montreal; we were the only Chamber that pushed in on that,” Steinocher said. “We had to actually go to city council and ask them to make sure the previous mayor doesn’t do the deal without the Rays in the room. We have always been on record of saying Major League Baseball is an economic impact to our community, they’re a major employer. We call it a business retention project.”

Steinocher said the Chamber has always been focused on finding a way to keep the Rays here and to do what they believe is “one of the most transformational projects any city in the world could do.” Part of that has been centered around ensuring they pick the “best partner” that will keep the promises that were made to the community for that site.

Steinocher said they invited the Chamber members to The Coliseum in St. Pete last week to listen to the proposals from the four teams vying to redevelop the 86-acre Historic Gas Plant District.

He said after the presentations it became “really clear to everybody” that Hines has a “balance sheet that allows them to keep moving forward even in an unpredictable economy.”

“Hines is partnering with the Rays, so we know that comes with the proposal, and they have the ability to quickly, in four and a half years coordinate a construction project while playing baseball,” Steinocher said. “For all those reasons it was very apparent to us, very quickly, that there was only one proposal that did that. It was the Rays/Hines proposal. We had always said if the Rays present that proposal to us, we would support it if it makes sense.”

He said it took the city several times to get the St. Pete Pier project complete and just last year it was named one of six winners of the Urban Land Institutes’ 2022 ULI Global Awards for Excellence. He’s confident the years of waiting to get the Tropicana Field project right will also prove successful.

“I liken this decision to your mama’s soup,” Steinocher said. “Only she knows the ingredients and no one, not your sister or brother, can make it the same way. I don’t believe people really understand what’s ‘in’ St. Pete. We’ve got the arts, we’ve got health industries, the entrepreneurs and we’ve got the Rays. I don’t want to go forward without one of the ingredients. Why would I want us to take out an ingredient that makes St. Pete so tasty? I don’t want us to go backward.”

The executive committee unanimously supported the Hines and Rays proposal, with five members abstaining due to having conflicts of interest, according to Steinocher.

Mayor Ken Welch is expected to select his preferred developer on Jan. 30 during the State of the City address.