Under the proposed deal, DC residents would pay $4 million per regular-season home game for the next 30 years.

“The proposal announced today is a bad deal for DC. If passed as is, taxpayers will be on the hook for over $1 billion for a stadium, surrounded by parking garages, that would sit unused 335 days a year. In stark financial terms, at a time when the District is facing a recession and tens of thousands of workers are losing their jobs, this proposal is asking DC residents to pay more than $4 million for each and every home game for the next 30 years, a proposal that doesn’t even include funding for a sorely needed Metro station expansion to give people alternatives to driving.

Unlike other DC sports investments, a new NFL stadium won’t pay for itself. It cannot be an economic engine with only eight home games and a handful of concerts. It won’t be active most of the year like Capital One Arena or Nats Park. On top of that, the team won’t even be moving its headquarters into DC, making it the only DC sports team that plays here but isn’t headquartered here.

What we need is a new neighborhood with tens of thousands of homes to support restaurants, small businesses, the arts, live performances, and more – importantly, activated 365 days per year instead of putting all our eggs in the basket of just eight home games. When we think about neighborhoods like the Wharf, Union Market, NoMa, Mt. Vernon Triangle, these are all major economic engines for our city in which we invested and intentionally created that didn’t require an NFL stadium to succeed.

I love football, and of course, a stadium sounds fun – but that’s not the question before us. Every choice has tradeoffs. Ask DC residents if they want $1 billion of their tax dollars to go toward building a stadium and parking garages instead of investing in neighborhoods with schools, locally owned businesses, playgrounds, roads, sidewalks, firehouses, and libraries. Every home that isn’t built to make room for a stadium and parking garages means rents and mortgages remain higher and more unaffordable than they need to be.

Today marks the start of a major debate at the Wilson Building over how to spend more than $1 billion of our tax dollars to reimagine one of the last remaining unbuilt spaces in our city. While I’ve been consistent for the past decade that I don’t think a stadium’s right for this site, over the coming weeks, the Council will consider the Mayor’s proposal, and I’ll continue to advocate for better economic planning that safeguards taxpayer dollars and grows – not takes from – our economy.”