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ST. LOUIS — Cardinals President Bill DeWitt III is beginning to talk about a massive refresh of Busch Stadium.

He says the organization has been pouring money each year into the ballpark, the foundation of the franchise and a centerpiece of downtown St. Louis. But the stadium is nearing its 20th birthday and could soon need hundreds of millions of dollars more in upgrades, from new seats to new floors to a new clubhouse.

And yes, DeWitt said in an interview with the Post-Dispatch, the club could seek taxpayer help to get it done.

But he insisted that subsidies the Cardinals have received in the past have paid off for the region — and that any new ones would pay off too.

The improvements themselves are not optional, he said, if the team wants to keep the park attractive and enjoyable for the next 20 years — and the next 80.

“We don’t want to have to start talking about a new ballpark for a long, long time — literally generations — because of so much investment we have, not only here but also Ballpark Village,� DeWitt said. “The idea of trying to move somewhere else just doesn’t make any sense to us. So let’s keep it up.�

Outside of the players, the stadium is the Cardinals’ most cherished asset and the driver of its most important revenue source: the more than 3 million tickets it sells each season.

And that’s especially important now. The economics of Major League Baseball are in flux. Teams are scrambling to figure out the future of cable television fees in a world of cord-cutters. ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ gambling has been widely legalized — and ballclubs are rushing toward sponsorships and partnerships with bookmakers. New owners with deep pockets have bought into the league and started spending, pushing the salaries of the best players into the stratosphere.

The DeWitts are pursuing new revenue streams of their own. They are studying how to stream their games online, directly to consumers. They’re backing a petition drive to put sports betting on the Missouri ballot this fall.

Now they need to figure out how to fund an update of the ballpark too.

DeWitt says he is not “fishing� for public money now. He might in the next few years. The club, he says, is just starting to study the stadium’s needs.

If the Cardinals ask for taxpayer help, however, it could be a fight. New leaders have taken over City Hall, vowing to do more for the poor and neglected. They are pushing to improve services for the homeless, rebuild north St. Louis and dig into longstanding inequalities. They have begun to take a harder line on subsidies for developers, forcing some concessions to city schools, affordable housing and workers.

Stadium subsidies already are getting more scrutiny across the country. Kansas City voters, for instance, rejected subsidies for baseball’s Royals and football’s Chiefs a few weeks ago.

“This just went down in flames,� said Aldermanic President Megan Green. “I don’t know why we keep going back to (public money for ballparks)."

Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, a leading candidate to be the state’s next governor, is not big on subsidies for professional sports stadiums either, campaign adviser Jason Roe said.

But a good deal could change things, Roe said. “As in anything,� he said, “the details matter.�

Representatives for Mayor Tishaura O. Jones, St. Louis County Executive Sam Page and current Gov. Mike Parson said it’s difficult to judge a proposal before it’s made.

But Jared Boyd, Jones’ chief of staff, said when that happens, the administration “will make sure St. Louis City residents can have their voice heard.�

Never-ending construction at Busch Stadium

Busch Stadium, which takes up four city blocks off Clark Avenue, is a red-brick monument to the national pastime and St. Louis’ place in it. There’s the cheering sea of red on game days. The World Series banners fluttering over the right-field scoreboard. The legends on the left-field wall. Bob Gibson. Ozzie Smith. Stan Musial.

It is also a never-ending construction project. City records show the Cardinals have pulled hundreds of building permits over the past 18 years. Sometimes they’re replacing a couple of toilets. Other times they’re replacing a scoreboard, redoing suites or wiring the whole place for Wi-Fi.

DeWitt said the club has put in new fire sprinklers throughout the building. They’ve replaced all of the TVs in the stadium since it opened, and $2 million in speakers. A few years back, the Cardinals upgraded security around the park, adding new cameras and barriers seen at entry points and outside the backlot, where backup generators and other sensitive equipment reside.

City estimates put the annual cost of work at $3.2 million per year. DeWitt said the real number is even higher, in the range of $8 million to $10 million per year. The city estimates may not account for all the improvements to the field, for instance. They also don’t include new baseball equipment, like a high-speed camera that can track just how fast a pitcher’s curveball spins.

But the work is worth it, DeWitt said. His family, which leads the team’s ownership group, considers the stadium part of a legacy they’re building in the heart of the city. And they plan to be around for a while.

DeWitt’s father, the team’s 82-year-old chairman, is in good health, DeWitt said. And arrangements have been made to maintain control when he isn’t. “We have a plan to remain committed, long-term owners of Cardinals,� DeWitt said.

And he hopes their legacy will last as long as Chicago’s Wrigley Field and Boston’s Fenway Park, the sport’s century-old classics.

“I don’t see any reason we couldn’t be similar to that,� he said. “Why can’t we be here for 100 years?�

But right now, the 45,000 seats are nearing the end of their expected lifespans, and there are cooler, more comfortable options available. Some of the all-inclusive clubs, which generate outsized revenue, need a reset. The clubhouse may need an upgrade to keep players comfortable and keep pace with advances in technology helping players train and recover from games and injuries.

There are also huge, aging systems that hide out of sight, like the electrical system and the chillers that power the air conditioning. The flooring may need an update, too.

“The building has 1.5 million square feet,� he said. “So when you go, ‘Oh, let’s put some tile down,’ it’s, ‘What’s the cost of that, times 1.5 million?’

“Anything you do that sort of services the whole building tends to be a big number.�

DeWitt cautioned that Cardinals staffers are just beginning to formally study the stadium’s needs, a process he said would take a year to complete. Some renovations could be put off for years. But they can’t wait too long or the costs will become overwhelming.

DeWitt said he’s seen other teams make that mistake, though he wouldn’t say who.

But the Milwaukee Brewers, one of the Cardinals’ National League Central Division rivals, waited so long to renovate publicly-owned American Family Field that . MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred came to town last year and warned local officials they were headed in the same direction as Oakland, which is losing its team because the league says its stadium is not viable. Several months later, the state of Wisconsin and local governments approved plans to put $600 million to update the park, roughly $100 million of which will come from the team.

In his interview with the Post-Dispatch, DeWitt emphasized that the Cardinals don’t yet know how much Busch renovations will cost and haven’t begun to seek taxpayer help.

But, DeWitt argued, the team would have a compelling case to make to public officials — thanks to the deal that built the new Busch 20 years ago.

Asking for public money?

“The new ballpark was incredible policy by the city and the state,� DeWitt said.

For starters, he said, the Cardinals borrowed most of the roughly $400 million for the project from private sources.

They rounded out financing with a $45 million loan from St. Louis County, $30 million in state tax credits and a $12 million contribution from the state transportation department in the form of a relocated highway access ramp. The city also agreed to freeze property taxes for the stadium at 2000 levels and eliminate an entertainment tax on Cardinals tickets that brought in about $5 million in its final fiscal year.

But in most of the years since the new stadium opened in 2006, the Cardinals have generated more tax revenue for the city despite the tax abatements. Excluding 2020, when the pandemic forced the team to play in an empty stadium, its tax payments to the city, adjusted for inflation, have averaged $16.4 million since the stadium opened. That’s a half-million dollars better than the average from 1997-2005.

They have also paid more to the state, averaging $26.8 million in remittances since the stadium opened compared to $18.8 million, adjusted for inflation, in the nine years before the ballpark opened.

“That’s having your cake and eating it, too,� DeWitt said.

St. Louis County, for its part, has been paying off the bonds it sold to make the $45 million loan — which, when paid off, will have cost the county more than $75 million. The payments come from taxes paid by visitors staying in county hotels, the same revenue that paid for The Dome at America’s Center, where the NFL Rams played.

But the county expects to be repaid by the Cardinals once the bonds are paid off, which could happen sometime next decade, said budget director Paul Kreidler.

David Stokes, the municipal policy director at the libertarian Show-Me Institute, which like many economists regularly lambastes such subsidies, said DeWitt had a point about the 2003 deal.

“By the standards of stadium deals, it’s far from the worst,� he said.

It’s possible the Cardinals could repeat the feat. A special tax on sales at the stadium — like those imposed on customers at St. Louis City SC’s CityPark to help pay for that stadium — would be bad but not an abomination, Stokes said.

But a broader tax increase or abatement would be bad news, he said.

“We’re going to have to see what they propose,� he said.

Green, the aldermanic president, is already drawing that line.

“Anything would have to come from money that’s generated within the stadium,� she said. “We cannot burden taxpayers or anyone who is not using the ballpark.�

‘Wide-eyed about the consequences’

DeWitt said the team, for now, has no specific subsidy in mind.

And its efforts to find new revenue streams are progressing.

A coalition of Missouri sports teams led by the Cardinals filed petition signatures Thursday in Jefferson City to put sports betting on the ballot in November. A win would bring in new revenue through partnerships with gambling companies. It would help engage younger fans, which than older cohorts. And it would help the team catch up with other teams, including all four of the Cardinals’ division rivals, already cashing in.

“We shouldn’t shy away from it,� DeWitt said. “If we’re trying to compete with these other teams on the field, it’s also a competition for revenue, because ultimately that’s what drives payrolls.�

The team is also preparing for the possibility that it may get its television rights back from its cable partner, Diamond ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ Group, which is in bankruptcy court. The team could create its own channel, like the Chicago Cubs and the New York Yankees, work with the Blues on a shared channel, or partner with other Diamond teams to find a new distributor. The team is also scrambling for a way to stream its games directly to customers regardless of what happens. They need it to reconnect with all the fans who have stopped paying for cable.

“At some point, we will solve this problem,� DeWitt said. “We just gotta get through the bankruptcy and other legal entanglements so that we can provide better access to our product, to our fans.�

The Cardinals are also scrambling to keep people buying tickets, hot dogs and beer as the team struggles on the field. Staffers have scheduled more theme nights, giveaways and other promotions. For three Fridays next month, they’re selling special tickets that include your first beer.

But DeWitt noted that the Cardinals compete in a league where ballparks regularly receive subsidies: In the 18 years since Busch opened, seven other teams have built stadiums, each with even more taxpayer help — $4.2 billion in total.

And the Cardinals have to compete with those teams on the field and in the front office. It’s a cutthroat business, DeWitt said.

“So you can play that game or not,� he said, “but you have to be wide-eyed about the consequences.�

He said if the team does seek another subsidy for its stadium, it would aim to make the deal with area governments as good as the last one.

“I’m not trying to ‘win’ against the city,� he said, “because I’m also a citizen.�

Derrick Goold of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.