Haslam Sports Group pitches $3.4 billion Brook Park dome and mixed‑use district; asks state for $600 million in bonds

Haslam Sports Group officials told the Arts, Athletics and Tourism Committee that the Cleveland Browns plan to build a 67,500‑seat enclosed stadium and a privately financed mixed‑use district in Brook Park and asked the state to provide $600 million in upfront bond proceeds under a new enabling statute to be written into the Ohio Revised Code.

The presentation, delivered by Ted Tai Wong, chief administrative officer and general counsel for Haslam Sports Group, described the project as “a transformational opportunity” and said the package includes a $2.4 billion dome stadium plus about $800 million to $1 billion of private mixed‑use development for a total project value presented as roughly $3.4 billion. “This is so much more than a stadium project,” Tai Wong said, describing the stadium as the anchor for hotels, experiential retail, and housing in a new Brook Park district.

Committee members were shown renderings and a series of financing charts that, according to Tai Wong, were prepared with consultants including RCLCO, Lincoln Property Company, HKS, and Inner Circle Sports. That analysis, he said, projects roughly $2.3 billion in state tax increment over the life of the bond period and about $1.3 billion of projected excess after debt service under the assumptions on the slides. To protect the state if revenues fall short, Haslam Sports Group proposed a combination of structural protections: (1) a statutory construct to allow the state to issue bonds against projected district tax receipts; (2) delaying state…