The rodeo will have a say on what to do with the Frost Bank Center and Freeman Coliseum grounds when the Spurs move downtown.
County commissioners on Tuesday approved an agreement with the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo intended to bring rodeo representatives into the planning process.
It’s a step forward, said Cody Davenport, executive director and CEO of the San Antonio Livestock Exhibition.
But an even weightier issue to wrestle with is coming soon.
“The big contract is a license agreement, and until we have the license agreement done, these [rodeo] grounds are not protected from outside developers,” Davenport said.
And yet, he added, “We’re working in the right direction. Things are getting positive again.”
The latest agreement comes after Davenport demanded, in a three-page letter to county officials in May, to be included in planning for the future of the rodeo.
Last year, voters approved Propositions A and B to help fund a new basketball arena downtown, as well as convert the existing arena and grounds into a stock show and rodeo district.
Davenport played a key role in getting those measures over the line in November.
He appeared at events, in media interviews and even worked the polls, with his sights set on using the voter-approved $193 million for developing the facilities needed for year-round, large-scale livestock operations.
But after he learned of a proposal to turn 3.6 million square feet of development on rodeo grounds into a mixed-use pedestrian district with retail and plazas, Davenport said such a project was “fundamentally incompatible” with what the county had promised voters.
As proposed, that project would keep Davenport from making his rodeo expansion plan — one that draws visitors and creates demand for restaurants, shopping and other amenities for locals — work within the same footprint.
“We just can’t support a development that is, in essence, anti-rodeo,” he said when making the case that the rodeo needed a seat at the table.
Rethinking the lease
At the Tuesday meeting, Commissioner Rebeca Clay-Flores (Pct. 1) introduced the grant and development agreement between the county, the Bexar County Coliseum Advisory Board and the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo to give rodeo leaders a say in future discussions.
Commissioners voted unanimously to approve the agreement.
Later this year, the county also will consider a new 20-year lease agreement with the rodeo. The existing contract expires this year.
“We have already sent over our first draft of it … last week, so it is already in the county’s hands right now and with their attorneys,” Davenport said.
The proposed agreement spells out how new structures will be built and operated, whether those buildings would be run year-round, control over the parking lots, and use of the Frost Bank Center after the Spurs pack up and move out.
It also addresses the rent that the nonprofit rodeo would pay to the county for use of the facilities that would extend far outside the current February timeframe.
The Bexar County Community Arenas Board has a 25-year long-term lease agreement with San Antonio Livestock Exposition (SALE) that expires on June 30, 2027, according to a financial statement.
The agreement calls for SALE to pay the board $1.4 million annually, multiplied by the Consumer Price Index. The board is also entitled to receive a portion of user fees collected by SALE if they exceed $450,000.
“We want to extend the current existing rodeo as we know it in the month of February … so a lot is changing from the current contract that we have right now,” Davenport said, and that depends on which entity controls the parking.
He added that he’s confident the rodeo and the county can work through those details and come to an agreement within the year. “We’re ready to go,” he said.
