By Staff Reporter
ORCHARD PARK — Look closely at a receipt from the new Highmark Stadium and you will find a line many fans did not expect. It is labeled “Game Day Tax” on concession and merchandise receipts, or “Erie Co S/C” on tickets. It is a 6% Erie County surcharge, and in August alone it raised $1,080,915.09.
That figure comes from the Erie County Comptroller’s Office, as reported by the WKBW 7 News I-Team on Sept. 28. August was a light month. The stadium hosted the Bills’ Blue & Red scrimmage on Aug. 8 and preseason games against Carolina on Aug. 15 and Pittsburgh on Aug. 27, according to the Associated Press. The regular season and concerts are still to come.
That makes the surcharge one of the largest continuing public revenue streams tied to the $2.1 billion stadium. It is also one of the least discussed.
What is taxed, and where the money goes
The surcharge applies to tickets, parking, food and drink, merchandise and other sales at the stadium, for Bills games and for other events such as concerts, WKBW reported. On a $40 concession order, that is $2.40. On an $80 sweatshirt, it is almost $5.
It was written into the 30-year lease. Under the deal, the Bills collect the money and turn it over to the county, and every April 30 the county passes it to Empire State Development, the state economic development agency, for capital improvements at the stadium.
“When the new agreement was reached with the Bills, the new lease to build the new stadium, the county is essentially – for almost all intents and purposes – out of the stadium business. The one part we have left is that we do levy this 6% tax,” Erie County Comptroller Kevin Hardwick told WBEN in August.
“Now it’s just the people that are using the stadium that are paying for those improvements. Again, this is not really an Erie County tax. We’re just kind of the middleman,” Hardwick said. “We take the money from the Bills, we give it to the state, and the state then makes the improvements.”
An Erie County spokesperson gave WKBW a similar account. The spokesperson said the revenue “will be used for continuing capital improvements at the new stadium” and that “the Erie County Comptroller’s Office and the Bills organization are the entities making the decision on how to best document and track all collected surcharge funds, which will be placed in a capital improvement fund to be managed by Empire State Development.”
The fund the surcharge replaces
Under the old stadium leases, Hardwick told WBEN, the county paid millions of dollars a year for capital work such as new turf or scoreboards, using sales tax or property tax revenue. The 2022 memorandum of understanding among the Bills, Erie County and New York State changed that, WKBW reported. It treats the surcharge revenue as “the County’s contribution to the Capital Improvement Fund.” Separately, it obliges the state-created Erie County Stadium Corporation to put $6.67 million a year for 15 years into a Maintenance and Repair Fund that the Bills can use for repairs and capital work.
Some economists like the model. Victor Matheson, a sports economist at the College of the Holy Cross, told WBEN that charging the people who use the building is “what an economist would actually advocate.” But he added a caveat.
“Obviously, I think it should be the business owner themselves,” Matheson said. “What’s unfair is it’s the taxpayers, rather than the owners, expected to pay the maintenance on, basically, what’s the factory for the Bills.”
The county steps back, the state steps in
Erie County no longer owns the stadium. County Executive Mark Poloncarz signed the deed transferring the stadium and surrounding complex to New York State this year. “As a result, for the first time since 1973 Erie County is out of the stadium business, saving Erie County millions of dollars annually,” he wrote in a column posted on the county’s website.
Before the June 1 handoff, he was blunter with WBEN. “It is a good thing that Erie County will be out of the (Bills’) stadium business,” Poloncarz said. “Let the people of the State of New York help out. It’s kinda of nice knowing people in New York City will be helping to pay some of these bills.”
Taxpayers covered $850 million of the construction cost: about $600 million from the state and $250 million from Erie County, according to CNY Central and the AP. The Pegulas covered the rest, including about $700 million in overruns, offset in part by $263 million in personal seat license sales.
State officials promise the investment will pay off. At the June 23 ribbon-cutting, Empire State Development President Hope Knight said the stadium would generate “more than $385 million in annual economic impact,” and state Sen. Patrick Gallivan said it “will generate revenue that far exceeds the investment made by taxpayers,” according to the governor’s office.
What isn’t public yet
The surcharge raises questions that the public record does not yet answer.
Where does it apply? WKBW reported that the surcharge also applies at the Bills Store across the street from the stadium. Hardwick told WBEN that shoppers at that store would not pay it. Fans deserve one answer.
Who reports the totals? The county says the comptroller and the Bills are still working out how to document and track the money. Neither has said whether monthly totals will be posted publicly, or whether Empire State Development will report the fund’s balance and spending.
What will it pay for? No public list yet shows which projects the capital fund will cover, or how those choices will be made between the state and the team.
Can it go up? Hardwick told WBEN he doesn’t foresee an increase over the 30-year lease, and that any change would need at least the approval of the Erie County Legislature.
Hardwick sees one upside. “So our Canadian friends come across, people from out of town come and they buy stuff. They’re paying for those improvements too,” he said, adding that “every dollar that they spend on the stadium now is money that I don’t have to pay for.”
The Buffalo Chronicle is seeking the monthly surcharge totals since the stadium opened from the comptroller’s office, and asking Empire State Development and the Bills how the capital fund will be reported. Any responses will be added to this story.
Featured photo: The new Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park during construction. Photo by Dekema via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
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