St. Pete Releases New Deal with Rays (and a fancy infographic!)

St. Pete Mayor Kriseman sent a memo to city council Friday afternoon regarding his new and improved deal with the Rays.  {Read the MOU here}

Still needing council approval, Kriseman says this deal addresses the December concerns about redevelopment revenues.  And he adds, "failing to support the MOU will almost certainly assure that the team will likely leave St. Petersburg and the region.  It will mean that the City will have to wait at least 12 years to redevelop 85 acres."

But the sky isn't exactly falling...and the claims are a little bit contradictory. 

Either the city keeps the Rays for 12 more years...or the city gets to redevelop the Trop sooner.  Kriseman wants to indicate this is the very last chance to get something done, but as I pointed out after the last last chance, the Rays are a loooooong way from giving up.

Click below to read the entire memo:

 

The city, which had said no public records existed on the negotiations up until this point...even whipped out a fancy infographic today to try to sell the deal!

This is a better deal than the previous one.  The Rays made some necessary concessions.  And Kriseman made it clear he wanted a deal done by Opening Day (I wrote why it was a bad idea to set a deadline).  So a vote could come up next week...if the mayor can drum up five of eight council votes. 

However, the more likely scenario is the issue gets tabled for a while so Kriseman can continue to work behind-the-scenes to cut deals for the votes he needs.