An agreement that would see Speedway Motorsports acquire the lease for Fairgrounds Speedway Nashville and bring the NASCAR Cup Series back to Music City faces a key deadline over the next month.
For the agreement to take effect, the deal needed to be first approved by the Fair Board of Commissioners, which it was back in March.
From there, it needs to be approved by 27 of the 40 Metro council members but that’s where things have gotten a little complicated. Councilman Colby Sledge, who oversees the district where the city-owned property lies, delayed a required community meeting until Tuesday night.
That doesn’t leave a lot of time for the deal to be read a required three times before the end of Mayor John Cooper’s term on August 31.
A caveat to the timeline is that a special meeting could be called by the mayor, vice mayor or 21 Metro Council members but if 13 of them are unable to be present for whatever reason, like a de facto filibuster, the group cannot conduct business.
Business like the reading of a proposed agreement between a private business and the city itself.
However, it’s worth noting that special meetings were recently called to approve agreement elements for the Titans, Predators, Sounds and the Nashville Soccer Club.
Calling such a meeting for Fairgrounds Speedway improvements would fall within the same parameter as other city stadium matters.
Two special meetings may even need to be called to reach a vote as Sledge could shelve the reading scheduled for the August 1 council meeting. While Cooper has pledged to sign the agreement, a new mayor may not share the same enthusiasm for the terms of the deal agreed upon after three years of negotiation.
The tactic of the past several months is best articulated as running out the clock for those hoping to nix an agreement that would see Speedway Motorsports operate the century old short track for the next 30 years while also bringing the Cup Series back for the first time since 1984.
Thus, all the proponents of the deal could immediately do was make their voices heard in the same ways they were heard in 2011 prior to a vote that successfully protected auto racing, a regional fair and the flea market at the fairgrounds.
To that end, speedway advocates organized a rally at the speedway before the public hearing on Tuesday, one attended by 2004 Cup Series champion Kurt Busch and veteran spotter Freddie Kraft.
“Tracks like this,” Busch told Sportsnaut, “in a local community like this, help build up the younger boys and girls who want to make it to NASCAR to showcase their talents. So, the more we can help local communities with their local short tracks, the better it’s going to be for big time racing.”
Even though the Nashville Fairgrounds hasn’t hosted the Cup Series since 1984, nor the Xfinity Series and Craftsman Truck Series since 2000, it has since boasted one of the strongest monthly local racing scenes throughout the country.
Most everyone currently racing on Sundays have passed through the Fairgrounds over the last 15 years. It’s a list that includes Busch, Chase Elliott, Erik Jones, William Byron, Ryan Blaney and Kevin Harvick. But the speedway has fallen in a state of disrepair and has been the focus of numerous political battles since the turn of the century.
That conflict has intensified over the past five years since the city entered into an agreement with local billionaire John Ingram to build a state-of-the-art stadium for his Major League Soccer franchise, Nashville S.C., that has in some ways begun to suffocate the historic short track that has long rested on the 117-acre grounds.
Ingram initially pledged support for the speedway but has since voiced concerns over how two 30,000 seat facilities can coexist on the same property. Speedway advocates have accused Ingram of funding an anti-speedway marketing campaign throughout Music City over the past calendar year.
Darden Copeland, a Nashville businessman and lobbyist, who also leads the Save My Fairgrounds group articulated that claim on Tuesday afternoon during the pro-speedway rally.
“My little boy, over the past month has noticed that I’m missing a few dinners and staying at the office a little bit later than I want to or am checking my phone more than I should,” Copeland said. “He asked me if I was mad at him and I said I wasn’t mad at him, but I am mad.
“I’m still mad because we worked so hard to save it and it hasn’t gotten improved. They still want to tear it down. I’m mad that they want to tear it down. I’m mad that have one person that is stonewalling this entire thing.”
He is referencing Ingram.
“I’m mad they think a renovation is a demolition,” Copeland added. “I’m mad that the promoters (of the track over the last 10 years) have had to negotiate with community activists for their race contracts. I’m mad that we have a billionaire soccer club owner that looked us in the eye and said, ‘I’m for you, and for the track and racing,’ sent a letter to that effect to the mayor and said he was for it. …
“Once he got approved, what did he do? He pulled a 180. He’s now spending millions against us. He’s got nine registered lobbyists, seven PR firms, five law firms and so I am mad. I am mad that we’re still having to fight this fight.”
And should the deal not get read three times before the end of the current mayoral term, that fight will begin anew with a new mayor.
For his part, Speedway Motorsports CEO Marcus Smith tells Sportsnaut that he remains confident a deal will get done. He says he has five different pathways to reach an agreement with the city that includes during the current mayoral term or the next one in whatever shape that takes.
In addition to Copeland, Smith has millionaire Big Machine Records CEO Scott Borchetta on his side when it comes to lobbying and connecting with decisionmakers in the Music City. Speedway Motorsports has also worked with various community groups to create meaningful education and engagement opportunities within the neighborhood surrounding the speedway.
Speedway Motorsports has reached community benefit agreements with Urban League of Middle Tennessee, the nearby high school and elementary school, Conexión Américas, Operation Stand Down Tennessee and the Boys and Girls Clubs of Middle Tennessee.
These agreements each have the stated goals of creating meaningful opportunities to positively impact the local community in ways beyond the financial impact of bringing NASCAR back to Nashville.
Beyond whatever long-term goals Ingram might have with the property, the general consensus amongst those opposed to the deal with Speedway Motorsports concerns the funding of the restoration of the century old short track.
In the agreement, Speedway Motorsports has agreed to cover the $6 million in design costs, $6 million in pre-development expenses and all improvement cost overruns. The State of Tennessee is providing a $17 million grant while the Nashville Convention and Visitors Corporation would pay $17 million for the use of the speedway and tourism promotion activities.
Speedway Motorsports would pay $1 million in annual rent with a one percent escalator, $650,000 in Convention and Visitors Corporation rent payments, ticket tax revenue, a share of gross revenue and concessions, facility sponsorship payments up to $600,000 per year with a one percent escalator and 10 percent of facility naming rights net revenue.
The track will host, on average, a Cup Series race every other year while the track can only host up to 10 race weekends per year as has been the standard over the past decade. Speedway Motorsports has also agreed to decrease the number of practice days from 25 days a year to 20.
Part of the speedway renovation project includes sound barriers to limit ‘maximum allowable sound levels during motorsports events,’ with Speedway Motorsports being subject to a fine for going over that agreed upon decibel level.
Speedway Motorsports would also oversee the management of local racing, the regional fair and the flea market as per the terms of the 2011 referendum.
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.