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Atlanta officials and the Atlanta Falcons reached a deal to build a new $1 billion stadium that addresses most of the concerns raised by the Atlanta City Council and the surrounding communities.

The tentative agreement was announced at a press conference Thursday afternoon at Atlanta City Hall with Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed flanked by Atlanta Falcons owner Arthur M. Blank, Gov. Nathan Deal and 10 members of the Atlanta City Council.

The agreement would include $50 million investments in infrastructure improvements around the new stadium as part of the actual costs of constructing the project.

In a separate development, the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation and Invest Atlanta have each committed to provide $15 million, for a total of $30 million, towards the redevelopment of the English Avenue, Vine City and Castleberry Hill neighborhoods.


The public contribution for stadium construction is capped at $200 million, which would come from the hotel-motel tax collected by the city — almost exclusively (more than 85 percent) from visitors and tourists, not residents of the city. Invest Atlanta would be asked to issue the bonds using the hotel-motel tax that currently supports the Georgia Dome. The existing hotel-motel tax revenue stream is the sole public funding source for the stadium construction and any risk associated with repayment is carried by the bond holders, not the city.

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