St. Pete releases Foot Locker incentive package
By Henry Queen
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Sep 13, 2024

St. Petersburg plans to dish out $475,000 in public money to Foot Locker in exchange for moving its headquarters to the Sunshine City.

St. Pete City Council will vote on the incentive package on Sept. 26. The money comes with numerous strings attached, including a provision requiring the Fortune 500 company to create 150 net new jobs. That's half the number of jobs Foot Locker would have been required to create had it moved to the Sunshine City several years ago.

Otherwise, the deal is almost identical to the one the city approved in October 2021. A month later, however, voters opted to kill the tax incentive program.

By 2022, Foot Locker no longer appeared interested in moving to St. Pete. That same year, voters reinstated the tax incentive program, allowing a package like this to move forward again.

"City administration recommends council approve this resolution," city documents said. "These incentives will bring another Fortune 500 headquarters to St. Petersburg and create new job and work opportunities to city residents, including South St. Petersburg CRA residents."

The base incentive package totals $235,000 and requires the following:

150 new jobs with an average salary of $120,000

An office lease of at least 100,000 square feet within city limits

A capital investment of at least $20 million dollars at the new headquarters

Good faith efforts to use small-, minority- and women-owned businesses

Foot Locker already subleases space from Franklin Templeton at 140 Fountain Parkway, and it's not known how much more it will require. JLL represents Foot Locker in its quest for St. Pete office space.

The other portion of the economic development deal — totaling up to $240,000 — is tied to hiring incentives for South St. Pete residents. The highest such stimulus, requiring salaries of at least 200% of Pinellas County's average wage, would give Foot Locker $10,000 per new hire from South St. Pete. The eligibility period extends 10 years after the headquarters' grand opening.

The hiring package is larger than the 2021 version because the $100,000 workforce development incentive was eliminated. That provision had required a workforce training plan and a three-year implementation of said plan. Additionally, Foot Locker no longer has to meet with St. Pete Works.

Cynthia Johnson, director of economic development for Pinellas County, said previously that the county's 2021 incentives remain available to Foot Locker.

"The Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners previously approved an Ad Valorem Tax Exemption Resolution to support the relocation of the company," Johnson said. "The Resolution approved the company as a qualified applicant for the ADVTE and allowed the company to continue their competitive process for their project without losing the ability to receive an ADVTE in the future."