{"id":429443,"date":"2026-10-16T12:38:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-16T12:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/429443\/"},"modified":"2026-10-16T12:38:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T12:38:08","slug":"tampa-city-council-votes-to-approve-rays-ballpark-bonds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/429443\/","title":{"rendered":"Tampa City Council votes to approve Rays ballpark bonds"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph sections-facilities \">The Tampa City Council took the \u201cfirst step toward issuing\u201d $80M in bonds for the Rays ballpark after its first vote \u201cended in a dramatic tie.\u201d Council members, by a 4-3 vote, approved a resolution that is \u201crequired to initiate the circuit court validation and authorization of the issuance of the potential debt associated\u201d with the city\u2019s $80M portion of the ballpark deal. Subsequent city council approval is \u201crequired to issue the bonds\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bizjournals.com\/tampabay\/news\/2026\/10\/15\/rays-bond-validation-city-council-tie.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.bizjournals.com\/tampabay\/news\/2026\/10\/15\/rays-bond-validation-city-council-tie.html\">TAMPA BAY BUSINESS JOURNAL, 10\/15<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph sections-facilities \">A first vote failed when it \u201cended in a tie\u201d after council member Bill Carlson, the swing vote on the ballpark, \u201cwas not present.\u201d The draw \u201csparked confusion on the dais as some council members scrambled to set a special meeting to reconsider the decision, which concerned the city\u2019s ability to take on debt to help pay for the stadium.\u201d They face time pressure: With the goal of opening the ballpark by 2029, the Rays have said that they \u201cwon\u2019t begin construction until public funding sources are approved.\u201d Minutes later, Carlson \u201cjoined the meeting virtually and resumed his role as the stadium\u2019s savior\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tampabay.com\/news\/2026\/10\/15\/rays-stadium-tampa-city-council-vote-bond-validation\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.tampabay.com\/news\/2026\/10\/15\/rays-stadium-tampa-city-council-vote-bond-validation\/\">TAMPA BAY TIMES, 10\/15<\/a>).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Tampa City Council took the \u201cfirst step toward issuing\u201d $80M in bonds for the Rays ballpark after&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":429444,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[3816,3986,3817,23181,135,137,136],"class_list":["post-429443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-baseball","tag-legal","tag-mlb","tag-rays","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=429443"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429443\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/429444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=429443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=429443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=429443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}