INGLEWOOD, Calif. – NFL commissioner Roger Goodell complimented New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on her leadership and said he’s “encouraged by the progress that’s being made” in the Buffalo Bills’ negotiations with the state to finance a new stadium, responding to a question from The Buffalo News on Wednesday during his state of the league press conference at SoFi Stadium, which hosts Super Bowl LVI on Sunday.
“The bottom line on it is we have to get a new stadium in Buffalo,” Goodell, a Jamestown native, said. “The governor has recognized that. It’s got to be a public-private partnership. All parties are going to have to work together. That means the state, the county, the team and the NFL to be able to achieve that.”
A sense of urgency is increasing in league circles as the Bills continue to negotiate with New York and Erie County to finance a new $1.4 billion open-air stadium on Abbott Road, across the street from Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park.
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NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.
When contacted by The News after Goodell's news conference, Hochul spokesman Matt Janiszewski acknowledged that "negotiations are ongoing" but declined to comment further.
The Bills have one season remaining on the lease at their current venue, which opened as Rich Stadium in 1973 and will require extensive structural work within the next five to six years, according to an engineering report commissioned by Erie County, which owns the stadium and serves as its landlord.
Bills owners Kim and Terry Pegula refuse to sign an extension on the lease until a deal is reached to build a new stadium. Public contributions could be around 73% of the cost – or $1.022 billion of the estimated price tag – as has been standard for recent stadium deals in other small market NFL cities, according to a Buffalo News analysis. The bulk of the funding would come from the state.
“There’s not much time on the lease, so you’ve got that, and then you’ve got the condition of the stadium,” Pittsburgh Steelers owner Art Rooney II, an NFL stadium committee member and former chair, told The News this week. “So we’re definitely talking about a short-term situation here, and I definitely think urgency is the right word to describe where they are right now.”
Ron Raccuia, the executive vice president of Pegula Sports and Entertainment and the Bills’ lead negotiator, told The News after the NFL owners’ meeting in October that the team could unveil a new stadium as early as the 2026 season, were a financing deal with the state reached by Dec. 31.
PSE officials have since declined to comment on whether that timeline to open the venue remains viable.
"As everyone has said, the talks are progressing in a positive manner," PSE spokesman Jim Wilkinson said Wednesday night. "We echo the commissioner’s comments from today and thank everyone for their collaboration thus far."
NFL owners are expected to vote on any agreement at the next league meeting from March 27 to 30 in Palm Beach, Fla.
“I’m encouraged by the progress that’s being made both at the state level and the county level and with the club,” Goodell said. “We have been involved in a lot of those discussions. The governor has stepped into a very difficult challenge … (but) she’s shown great leadership in bringing the parties together, looking at how to do that.
“We have shared as much as we can with all parties. But there’s a lot to negotiate here, not just how this is done but also the lease. So I’m not disappointed in the timing, necessarily. I’m more interested in making sure that we balance everything fairly and we put ourselves in the best position of really giving the fans what they deserve in Western New York, which is a stadium that’s new and that can serve the purposes of that community for several decades.”
Hochul, a Western New York native who took office in August, has repeatedly said she is confident a financing deal can be reached by March and that stadium funding will be included in the final state budget, which must be approved by the Assembly and Senate by April 1.
“It’ll be done by March 31,” Hochul told The News editorial board last month. “That’s the date for our budget. We’re in conversations with the Bills and they understand the process. They’re not getting anxious.”
The Erie County Legislature has said it will take up to 30 days to review any agreement.
“I think the idea is we’re going to get a deal done that’s right for all, that benefits the community, that ensures the Buffalo Bills are the Buffalo Bills,” Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said in January.
The Bills’ 10-year lease at Highmark Stadium expires in July 2023.
New York commissioned an engineering study that led to the state and county joining PSE in rejecting the idea of major renovations due to the cost of updating the half-century-old venue, compared with building a new stadium.
The Bills plan to construct a stadium that seats between 60,000 to 62,000 fans with room for up to 5,000 more spectators on a standing-room-only party deck, which aligns with historic attendance figures.
The team intends to sell approximately 50,000 season tickets, which will all require the purchase of personal seat licenses to help fund construction.
A dome or retractable roof has been ruled out, but the tentative design calls for about 80% of the seats to be covered by a partial roof or overhangs to protect fans from rain and snow.
“This is a process,” Goodell said at the NFL owners’ meeting in October in Manhattan. “And there has to be a public-private partnership here that has to be managed, but I think everyone’s coming to the table with the intent to make sure that the Buffalo Bills are secure in Western New York for generations. I think that’s important and that’s what we want to achieve.”
