At the June 3, 2025, hearing before the Missouri Senate Fiscal Oversight Committee about Senate Bill (SB) 3, The Show-Me Sports Investment Act, all the usual suspects took a moment to dust off their talking points about why taxpayers should subsidize the construction or renovation of stadia for the wealthy Kansas City Chiefs and Royals.
There wasn’t anything new in the testimony. It included romantic nostalgia for bygone players and the pride we have in our teams, claims about all the economic impacts that these subsidies will drive, and, of course, fears that the teams will leave if we don’t give them what we want.
Toward the end of the supporters’ testimony, Wes Rogers, a Kansas City councilmember and former state legislator, rose to speak in favor. His remarks included the following:
I make my living selling and leasing commercial dishwashers to restaurants. Already, no matter where the Royals and Chiefs go, Kansas is kicking our butt. I install more dishwashers in the state of Kansas than I do in the state of Missouri, period. And there’s a whole bunch of reasons for that I’m happy to talk about later. But I promise you this, if we put this stadium or the Chiefs stadium in Kansas, my guys are going to be to Kansas more than they are to Missouri and that’s going to continue. And so we can say this doesn’t have an economic impact. I know it does because I’m paying 20 guys to go to Kansas instead of Missouri to work and that number is going to increase.
This is odd testimony in favor of subsidies as a source of economic development because the Chiefs and Royals already have stadia in Missouri. Yet (despite this?) he argues “Kansas is kicking our butt,” and he is seeing more business on the Kansas side. Redirecting taxpayer dollars toward new or refurbished facilities won’t change that.
I suspect Rogers knows that the real reasons for Kansas outperforming Missouri are the “whole bunch of reasons” he alludes to. For example, the high tax rate and low level of services Kansas City provides—in large part because of taxpayer-funded subsidies, such as those for sports teams, being such a huge drain on city coffers.
Earlier in his testimony, Rogers offered, “I’m actually reading economic studies about baseball, which I’ve never done before.” This is good news, but if the statement above is a reflection of his grasp of the material so far, he needs to do more reading—and rereading.
