Republican Ohio Governor Mike DeWine in front of Haslam Sports Group. (Photo: WEWS.)
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine hopes Ohio will host the Super Bowl at the new Cleveland Browns stadium, but he said the NFL draft is likely to be announced soon.
“The commissioner certainly made it very clear yesterday that the Browns would receive their draft refund in a relatively short period of time,” DeWine said Friday. “You saw what happened in Pittsburgh with 350,000 people – that’s a big deal.”
He added that people from outside the state will also be brought in for the project.
“I think that’s probably the next thing we’ll see, probably before the Super Bowl,” he said with a laugh. “We are optimistic about an eventual Super Bowl.”
But does Cleveland have the infrastructure for the Super Bowl? NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said more hotels are needed in the area – a total of about 60,000 rooms.
According to the latest market report from the Newmark real estate agency, there are just over 22,000 hotel rooms in the area.
There are several new projects on the drawing board, including two hotels planned for the suburban stadium district.
DeWine was asked if he thought more resources should be put into this to try to get a Super Bowl.
“Well, I don’t think the government should invest in hotel rooms,” he replied. “But I think it’s something that the private sector is certainly looking at.”
DeWine is trying to stop government funding of private projects because he initially disagreed with lawmakers’ proposal at Brook Park.
Part of the stadium financing plan involves using unclaimed taxpayer funds. A $600 million state grant for the stadium is still in limbo amid litigation over the state’s decision to seize unclaimed funds for professional sports facilities and other projects. Ohio holds billions of dollars in lost money from elderly bank accounts, insurance payouts, utility deposits and other sources.
DeWine is once again pushing his idea to support finance stadiums by raising the sports betting tax.
“If the courts definitively tell us this is illegal, we will have to go back and look at other options,” he said.
“The most logical choice is to tax our sports gaming companies… We don’t want to take that money and more from schools.”
As construction progresses, public funding for the project remains uncertain.
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This article was originally published on News5Cleveland.com and are published in the Ohio Capital Journal under a content sharing agreement. Unlike other OCJ articles, it is not available for free republication on other news outlets because it is owned by WEWS in Cleveland.
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