Approved deal doesn't have exploratory fee, but includes penalties if Rays leave the city

Mayor Rick Kriseman promised voters in 2013 that if the Tampa Bay Rays want to leave their home at Tropicana Field, they could — as long as the Rays paid the city to look elsewhere.

"If the Rays simply do not want to be here any longer — then they should be given the opportunity to pay an exploratory fee in order to look at other locations, provided those locations are in the Tampa Bay area," Kriseman said at the time.

Kriseman presented the St. Petersburg City Council an agreement between the city and the Rays in January 2016. Under this plan, St. Petersburg gave permission to the Rays to look elsewhere for a new home. 

The council voted 5-3 in favor of the plan. The decision gave the club three years to search for a new stadium site in Pinellas and Hillsborough counties, but what the agreement was missing was an exploratory fee simply to look for a new location.

In an interview with PolitiFact Florida, Kriseman said he didn't remember pledging a fee just for looking at new locations, but argued the deal was structured so the Rays would still face penalties should they make a decision to leave St. Petersburg.

"There's a penalty for leaving prior to the end of the original use agreement, but the even larger penalty is waiving their rights to the development proceeds," Kriseman said. "That's substantial." 

Kriseman has a point there.

The agreement, otherwise known as a memorandum of understanding, places all of the proceeds from development on the Tropicana site into an interest-bearing escrow account. The Rays and the city have agreed to split revenue derived from the development of the Trop site 50-50 if the team remains through the end of its lease in 2027, or chooses to build a new stadium there.

However, if the Rays decide to terminate the agreement and leave St. Pete, than 100 percent of the money in escrow will be given to the city.

The deal also requires the Rays to pay a fee if the team left the city.The fee amount would depend on how long was left in the team's lease, starting at $4 million a season until December 2018, dropping to $3 million a season from 2019 to 2022, and $2 million from 2023 through 2026. The team's current lease expires in 2027.

This agreement marked the end of years of back and forth between the city and the Rays.

The Rays now have until Dec. 31, 2018,  before the agreement expires. Once the agreement expires, the Rays must notify the city whether it wants to negotiate a new agreement in which it stays in St. Petersburg past 2027 or terminate the agreement and leave the city before 2027.

In April, Hillsborough County mapped out eight possible locations for the new stadium, but narrowed the list down to one at the Channel District-Ybor City area.

Kriseman promised to make the Rays pay a fee simply to look at new stadium locations. The city gave permission to the Rays to look elsewhere in Tampa Bay in 2016, but that agreement did not include an exploratory fee like Kriseman promised. Instead, it included other fees that will ding the Rays substantially if they actually move. Overall, we rate this promise Compromise.