Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton Comments on Titans Stadium Investment, Residency Bill, and School Funding Status

Live from Music Row Monday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. –  host Leahy welcomed Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton to the newsmaker line to comment upon the proposed budget for Titans Stadium upgrades, the pending residency bill lawsuit, and school funding status.

Leahy: We are delighted to welcome to our newsmaker line, the Speaker of the Tennessee House of Representatives, our good friend Cam Sexton. Welcome, Speaker Sexton.

Sexton: Good morning. How are you?

Leahy: Well, we’re great. Hey, on Friday, I heard an interview you did with Dan Mandis where you broke some news that I hadn’t heard before. You told him that the state legislature was contemplating the proposed $500 million bond offering from the state to help build this proposed enclosed stadium for the Titans.

You noted that $700 million will be coming from the Adams family, the folks that own the Titans. And what surprised me at the very end of the interview, you said you anticipated $700 million of this $2 billion would come from the city of Nashville.

My question to you is, is that true about the city and how on earth can Metro National Davidson County, which is virtually bankrupt and has a 100-year-old water supply system that is falling apart, come up with $700 million?

Sexton: Yes, I don’t know what they plan on trying to do for the $700 million. But yes, it would be a three-way partnership if it goes through. And so the Adams family and the Titans would put in about $700 million.

The city of Nashville will put in about $700 million. The state will put in $500 million. If the city doesn’t put in its money, then the state is not putting in its $500 million.

Leahy: But it seems to me it would be financially and fiscally reckless for a virtually bankrupt city to try to raise $700 million to support this venture.

Sexton: Well, it depends on what they want to do, I guess. I’m not running the city of Nashville. I know from the state of Tennessee we’re in very good financial shape to be able to do something like this.

I do know that long-term success of that stadium and keeping the Titans here, as well as trying to attract other big events to the Nashville area, which I think we would be able to do – not if it’s just an open-air stadium, but if it is a new, enclosed stadium that would offer an opportunity to host bigger events that we never hosted before.

Leahy: Doesn’t the state proposal to put up $500 million in this bond, isn’t that encouraging, a virtually bankrupt city to get further into debt with this proposed $700 million?

Sexton: We’re not encouraging … I mean, the Titans came to us, and the Titans came to the city, and put together the partnership and asked for this.

I think the city could dedicate some hotel and motel tax to it or maybe find some additional sales tax that’s coming around the stadium potentially that they could be collecting. There’s an opportunity to pay it back.

I’m sure they’re doing the same thing. And looking at what we are, which is a return on investment, and how quickly do you think you could recoup that money?

If you get potentially a Super Bowl or WrestleMania, then those things could go a long way toward helping pay off the bond a whole lot quicker than probably if it was just a normal stadium currently, like they have.

Leahy: But is it the proper role of state government, even city government, to provide financial assistance to a private enterprise?

In Los Angeles, the SoFi Stadium was $5 billion, but it was entirely, from what I can tell, privately financed. Why can’t the Titans and other real estate investors come up with the money on their own and experience the risk and the reward?

Sexton: I think you also have to look at, not all NFL owners are the same. By definition, they’re wealthy. I think if you look at the net worth of the Adams family, I think they rank 25th of 32 or somewhere around that area.

I think we look at it from a perspective of what will this allow us to continue to bring into the state, and is it a wise investment and will it pay off?

And that’s why we’re looking at the old stadium based on what we had put in back in the day, and what return on investment we think we’ve had with that stadium.

The real issue that we have, is we have a stadium that cannot really be renovated. It was made out of more concrete than people realize, and there are structural problems. And so the renovation, even if you just do something, doesn’t really prolong the life of that stadium.

And so is it a wiser investment to spend over a billion dollars of whatever makeup from whoever on a stadium that you don’t expand the life of?

But is there an investment from the state, that if we do make an investment and we do get the Super Bowl or something like that, does that open us up to collecting more revenue?

And the way I look at it is we’re a sales-tax-driven state, and anything that we can do to continue to bring in tourism, which is one of our biggest industries, and bring people into the state, if that helps us and helps us pay off that investment, then it’s probably a positive thing. If it doesn’t help us pay off the investment, then it’s probably not a good thing to do.

Leahy: On another controversial topic, have you signed the three-year residency bill that would require someone to live in the state for three years before getting on the primary ballot for a federal office, either the House of Representatives or the U.S. Senate.

Have you signed it? Has the Speaker of the Senate, Lieutenant Governor McNally, signed it, and has it been transmitted to the governor?

Sexton: I don’t think it’s been transmitted to the governor yet. I haven’t seen it come across my desk since the Senate passed it. At first, he would have to sign it before I did. I would expect when I get into the office today, it’s probably sitting on my desk to be signed.

Leahy: And so you will sign it today if it’s on your desk?

Sexton: Yes. I’ll sign it and then we’ll ship it off to the governor. As soon as I get it, I’ll sign it. I’m sure there’s a host of other bills that are there to be signed as well.

Leahy: Do you expect the governor to sign that bill, veto it, or allow it to become law without a signature?

Sexton: I’m not sure. We’ve spoken about that in various other bills and he just said that he was going to weigh it when it got to him. I don’t know which direction he’s going to go.

I know that someone has already filed a lawsuit against us which, we haven’t even signed the bill and they filed a lawsuit. I don’t think I’ve ever experienced that before, but we’ll see.

I don’t really know what direction he may go at this point. But I’m sure that the lieutenant governor and I will sign it and send it over to his desk.

Leahy: What’s the status of the education financing bill, the big program that the governor has? Is that going to be approved for this session?

From what I see, there’s an awful lot of questions about that formula for, new formula for, funding. What’s the status of that?

Listen to the full interview here:

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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.

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