The Spurs are planning to build a $1.2B "basketball palace" in downtown San Antonio, and they are “working behind the scenes with city leaders to figure out how to pay for it,” according to sources cited by Madison Iszler in a front-page piece for the SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS. Spurs Sports & Entertainment is proposing “footing the bill for about one-fifth of the planned arena,” according to sources. Team owner Peter Holt is “eyeing a city-controlled downtown tax zone" to help pay for the project. Several weeks ago, Spurs execs approached state Sen. José Menéndez about the possibility of "tapping it for an arena." Iszler noted the city however may “have other plans for the money.” City Manager Erik Walsh has said that the tax fund “will pay for upgrades at the Alamodome and an expansion of the Henry B. González Convention Center.” City officials have been “talking with the Spurs for at least the last year and a half” about relocating the team’s home court in a bid to “infuse San Antonio’s sleepy downtown with more energy and spectacle.” The parties have signed non-disclosure agreements to “keep their talks under wraps.” But sources indicated that the Spurs and the city have “already set part of their emerging plan in motion.” City officials are also “considering how to pay for construction of the arena.” Iszler noted potential government funding sources could “include municipal bonds, a visitor tax like the one that paid for the Frost Bank Center and the sales tax zone created by the Legislature last year” (SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS, 6/30).
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