Although the possibility of Salt Lake City landing either a Major League Baseball team or a National Hockey League franchise may be years away, the state Legislature set the process in motion to build homes for the professional sports teams with the passage of enabling bills that Gov. Spencer Cox has now signed.
Cox signed both HB562, “Utah Fairpark Area Investment and Restoration District,” and SB272, “Capital City Revitalization Zone,” which outline the state’s plans to raise funding for new stadiums through tax increment financing.
“If you’re going to build a stadium somewhere, there will be benefits to that community. That will attract people, not just people from Utah, but people from outside Utah. It will attract other businesses, it will attract hotels, it will attract restaurants and that economic incentive,” Cox said. “There is an opportunity for us to use the benefit of that to help incentivize a stadium to be built.”
Initial versions of HB562 contained provisions for increased statewide hotel taxes to go to stadium funding. That provision died over criticism from other areas of the state where no benefit would accrue from a Salt Lake City-area stadium.
The baseball stadium addressed in HB562 would fund the facility — located on the west side of Salt Lake City — in partnership with the Larry H. Miller Co.
The “revitalization zone” in SB272 includes about 100 acres in downtown Salt Lake City, which would encompass a hockey and basketball arena, a project proposed by Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith’s Smith Entertainment Group.