Ravens Insider: Maryland Stadium Authority board approves Orioles lease

[ExtremeRavens]

The Maryland Stadium Authority board on Monday unanimously approved a long-sought lease with the Orioles, sending it to the state Board of Public Works for an approval that would end an arduous, five-year negotiation just two weeks before the current lease is set to expire..

The authority, in effect the team’s landlord, met at Camden Yards in a hastily called session. There was a brief closed session to address an unspecified legal question, then a short discussion followed by a vote.

The Board of Public Works is to meet in the afternoon to consider the lease.

The lease includes multiple options and scenarios. It could be for 15 years, or as long as 30 years. The longer term is triggered if the club secures the necessary governmental approvals for a separate ground lease granting it rights to redevelop the B&O Warehouse and an area surrounding Camden Yards. Unlike in a prior proposed deal that was opposed by Democratic state Senate President Bill Ferguson and others, the team would need to submit a master development plan. That plan, in effect a blueprint for the property, would also have to be approved by the stadium authority and Board of Public Works.

Sparse outlines of the lease appeared on the boards’ websites late last week with no explanation of the terms. The  administration of first-year Democratic Gov. Wes Moore announced an agreement had been reached, but said it was waiting to provide details until the boards completed their work. Moore chairs the three-member public works board, and appointed the chair of the stadium authority board.

The board of the Maryland Stadium Authority met Monday, chaired by Craig Thompson, at the head of the table. The board unanimously approved a lease with the Orioles. (Amy Davis/Sun staff)

Two officials with knowledge of the document told The Baltimore Sun last week that the deal extends the current terms, under which the Orioles pay rent and the stadium authority operates and maintains the ballpark, for at least five years (it could be much longer) or until development rights are negotiated. At that point, the ballclub could choose to continue with a 15-year lease, with four five-year options under the current lease terms. Or the club could forgo its option of leaving after 15 years, extend the lease to 30 years, but stop paying rent and gain authority over stadium operations and maintenance, a costly function that falls to the stadium authority today.

The lease was first set to expire at the end of 2021. With no new deal imminent, the parties agreed in February 2021 to extend the agreement for two years, through Dec. 31, 2023, with the club retaining the right to exercise a one-time, five-year extension by Feb. 1, 2023. Orioles CEO John Angelos declined last winter to exercise that option.

In September, Moore and Angelos announced a 30-year “deal,” but it turned out to be a nonbinding memorandum of understanding, not a lease. Then, a lease was proposed by the administration on Dec. 8, but withdrawn the same day because of opposition by the governor’s fellow Democrats.

Looming over the lease negotiations is the memory of the NFL’s Colts leaving town for Indianapolis on a March night in 1984 following a dispute with the city over improvements to Memorial Stadium. Baltimoreans’ anxieties about the Orioles’ future were heightened when Louis Angelos, the owner’s youngest son, filed suit in Baltimore County Circuit Court in June 2022 against his mother, Georgia, and brother, John, over what he characterized as John’s attempt to take control and ownership of their fortune after his father became incapacitated. Louis Angelos suggested in the suit that his brother could move the team to Nashville, Tennessee, where he has a home, a scenario John Angelos said would not happen. The family settled the suit in February.

Lease negotiations with the club began informally in 2018.

In 2020, the stadium authority began studying a shift in stadium funding with an eye on keeping the Orioles happy and in Baltimore. Under the new approach, approved in 2022 by the Democrat-controlled General Assembly and signed into law by Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, the stadium authority can borrow up to $1.2 billion to pay for stadium improvements — $600 million each for the Orioles and Ravens. But no bonds can be issued without a lease, and the lease must be long enough to pay off the longest-term bonds.

With Hogan leaving office in January 2023, John Angelos  temporarily halted the lease negotiations following the November 2022 election until Moore took office, according to a letter Angelos wrote to Moore that was obtained by The Sun.

Officials in Hogan’s administration had hoped to complete a new lease before Hogan’s second term ended, as they did with the Ravens in December 2022.

This article will be updated.

View the full article