Plans for the Dallas Wings to move from Arlington to a downtown convention center arena in the city of their namesake began with a phone call in November 2022.
Rosa Fleming, who heads the city department that manages the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center, said Mayor Eric Johnson’s office asked if she could organize a tour of the Dallas Memorial Auditorium for representatives of WNBA teams.
The tour was scheduled for Nov. 16. Just eight days earlier, city voters had approved a hotel tax increase to pay for a new convention center and related projects, including renovations to the center’s attached, more than 60-year-old arena. The tax increase was expected to raise $1.2 billion for the new convention center and another $300 million for renovations to the city’s iconic Fair Park.
The Wings’ move downtown marks the latest chapter in the city’s plans to develop the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center and create a new sports and entertainment district around it.
A women’s basketball team has been a focus of mayoral attention, and Mayor Johnson formed a City Council committee in 2022 to focus on attracting and retaining professional sports teams. Meanwhile, a renovated arena will likely need a new anchor tenant sooner rather than later.
City had planned to apply all-out pressure on the Wings from the start.
Fleming said the city plans to pitch the potential relocation as an economic opportunity for both the Wings and the city, positioning the team as a key part of a downtown Dallas revitalization plan.
“They’re based in Arlington, and we knew it would be a big deal to move a franchise to another city,” Fleming said this week after the City Council approved a proposal to pay the Wings $19 million to relocate to the Dallas Memorial Auditorium for at least 15 years. “It’s a big deal to make them leave the place they’ve been since the beginning.”
Dallas Wings President and CEO Greg Bibb said it was Johnson who first suggested visiting the arena, and that it was important for the team to literally call Dallas home.
Bibb expected the tour to be low-key and introductory, and said he expected it to be led by Mayor Johnson and at least one member of his staff, rather than by Johnson, Fleming and the roughly 30 other city representatives.
“It was a large, inclusive group of people, each with a representative who told us what this project would mean for us from their perspective,” Bibb said. Dallas Morning News“And frankly, I was shocked. I was at my first prep meeting and I didn’t expect this.”
Tours and cold calls
Fleming said the first tour group, scheduled for November 2022, included Johnson, City Councilman Omar Narvaez and at least one member of their staff, as well as other convention and event services workers. Also on the tour were representatives from Visit Dallas, the nonprofit that contracts as the city’s tourism bureau, and the Oak View Group, the convention center’s management company.
They had Bibb and another team executive walk through the arena, sit in the seats and try to portray the Wings as regulars there, Fleming said. news Concept drawings of a renovated arena featuring the Wings logo were unveiled.
“We made it clear that they are wanted,” Narvaez said.
Fleming said the first tour will lead to a second tour in December 2022, this time when the Wings will measure the arena.
Fleming didn’t stop with the first tour.
“I just started telling him about Dallas,” she said.
Fleming asked how the tour went and then called to ask if he knew a significant portion of his ticket sales were coming from Dallas residents.
“Each meeting we added a different layer,” Fleming said. “I love the Wings and that’s what it’s all about, but we had to focus on economics and what’s best for the city.”
The right time
While city officials were working on attracting Wings in 2022, they were also working on a master plan for the convention center and the area.
The City Council voted in February of that year to demolish the convention center and build a new, larger center nearby, estimated to cost about $3 billion. The project is a cornerstone of the city’s redevelopment plans for a large swath of downtown Dallas, stretching from Eddie Bernice Johnson Union Station on the southwest edge of the city’s central business district to the Dallas Farmers Market.
Demolition of the current buildings is expected to free up about 30 acres of land to allow for the construction of new restaurants, retail, hotels, parks and housing. The city plans to use bond funds for the project and repay the bonds with revenue from two new revenue streams, including an increase in taxes collected from Dallas room rentals approved by voters in November 2022. The second revenue stream will come from funds derived from a project financing zone, which allows the city to retain a portion of state sales and hotel taxes collected from businesses within a three-mile radius of the convention center.
Two funding mechanisms to pay for the convention center and related projects are expected to generate about $4 billion over 30 years.
Fleming said Memorial Auditorium, which seats about 10,000 people, is currently used about 12 times a year and is not compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act, but was envisioned as a renovated multi-use facility.
By the time she got the call from the mayor’s office to organize the first tours, she already had data examining the feasibility of hosting a range of sports and cultural events there.
The Wings’ contract with the University of Texas at Arlington expires at the end of the 2025 season. Bibb said the team is already looking to its future and exploring expansion through 2022. He said the team has about 60 employees and at least 100 part-time and seasonal workers on game days.
“Our business had gotten to the point where we needed to start thinking about the future, capacity, the services we could provide for our fans, facilities for our players to practice and train,” Bibb said. “We had just begun discussions with our current partners in Arlington, so the timing was right from (Dallas’) perspective.”
The Wings share College Park Center and two practice courts with student-athletes. Increased demand from fans made securing more space a priority, Bibb said. The campus arena can seat 6,200 spectators when configured for basketball games. The Dallas arena’s final capacity has yet to be determined, but the team hopes to add at least 2,000 seats for its 20 home games, “which could translate into a significant revenue boost,” Bibb said.
“That building was built by the University of Texas at Arlington, first and foremost for the student-athletes who attend the University of Texas at Arlington, and that’s only natural,” Bibb said. “We are guests in that space, and they are very gracious hosts, but at the end of the day we remain guests.”
turning point
Fleming said the turning point in the negotiations came last spring, when Bibb and city officials began discussing performance records and ticket sales. He said the $19 million incentive package was needed to cover the team’s relocation costs.
“Basically the mayor approached them about relocating, they weren’t necessarily looking to relocate,” Fleming said, “so we need to give them an incentive to want to leave the city where they have long-standing relationships, where their offices are and everything is there. So that incentive will cover some of the cost for them to relocate to Dallas.”
Ahead of the April 24 City Council vote, Bibb said he feels both confident and nervous about whether the city will approve the deal.
“I’ve been in this industry for a long time and I know that with a process like this, the outcome isn’t known until the votes are officially cast,” Bibb said.
Before the City Council vote, Fleming and Bibb stood side by side to speak to council members about their teams and the city’s plans. After the vote passed, Fleming and Bibb stood and hugged each other as the chamber erupted in applause.
The deal still requires approval from the WNBA Board of Governors, which received the go-ahead from the city of Dallas the same day. Bibb said the board will consider a clearer plan from the city before approving it. The team is expected to play the 2024 and 2025 WNBA seasons at College Park Center before relocating to Dallas in 2026.
“It’s fair to say we’re in a good spot in the league,” Bibb said. news“I think the City Council vote was the biggest and latest hurdle in this entire process.”
Bibb credited Johnson and Fleming with bringing the Dallas Wings to Dallas.
“This was the mayor’s vision and the mayor has been involved every step of the way,” Bibb said, “but it was Rosa Fleming who kept the train on the tracks and kept it running. And in my opinion, she was the one who got us to the council and got the vote through the council.”
Johnson did not respond to a request for comment. In a statement after the City Council vote, Johnson said he was excited about what the deal means for the city.
“This deal is a top priority for us because we know the Dallas Wings will be a big hit in the city they represent,” Johnson said. “We’re excited to welcome the Dallas Wings to the heart of the city, and we’re even more excited to see this franchise become the anchor of a new convention center district that will transform downtown Dallas for decades to come.”
