THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon. The Jaguars and Jacksonville have been working together since the early 1990s when Touchdown Jacksonville and Mayor Ed Austin's administration partnered to lift north Florida into the big leagues: The National Football League.
Since November 30th, 1993 it's been a labor of love to build an NFL franchise, a major league city, and a passionate fan base. Over and over and over again, through 29 seasons on the field, we've done just that.
There were times when it was hard - really, really, really hard. Some thought we weren't up to it. But we kept working and innovating and believing in what was possible.
From Wayne Weaver to Shad Khan, from Mayor Austin to Mayor Delaney to Mayor Peyton to Mayor Brown, now to Mayor Deegan, it's always been about working to get the job done.
Today we announce the city of Jacksonville and the Jaguars will continue the endeavor to make our community, as was promised years ago, the bold new city of the south.
We'll do it in a downtown stadium that shows our doubters and reinforce with our supporters that we will not be denied. We will never be denied because we are true to the Jaguars' brand, proud, bold and committed.
So I'd like to introduce to you, although they need no introduction, the president of the Jaguars, Mark Lamping, the owner of the Jaguars, Shad Khan, the mayor of our great city, the honorable Donna Deegan, and the lead negotiator for the city of Jacksonville, Mike Weinstein.
Now I'd like to invite Mr. Khan to come to the podium.
SHAD KHAN: Well, thank you. Thank you, everyone, for being here.
Indeed, it's a great day. I had the privilege last night of joining Mayor Deegan for a moment of celebration. But today it's my honor to publicly express my gratitude to the mayor, her staff, our staff, Ron Salem, city council president, and many others who gave everything they had so in four years we'll retire the term 'stadium of the future'. It's finally going to be done and complete.
Of course, the future doesn't happen if it's not for the commitment to Jacksonville made more than 30 years ago by Dolores and Wayne Weaver. Their legacy will forever be unrivaled and they deserve our never-ending respect and thanks. So thanks, Wayne and did Dolores.
I'll always be humbled that Wayne trusted me to carry on the Jaguars' tradition in Jacksonville, a city that he and Dolores have always loved. I love Jacksonville immensely, and I especially love what's possible here.
A lot has changed from the inaugural season for the Weavers in 1995, to my first year in 2012, right through to today as we prepare to celebrate the Jaguars' 30th anniversary in the NFL.
But there's been one constant throughout: everyone wants to doubt Jacksonville. As of last night, that should no longer be the case. People can move on with other stuff, okay? Not a good day for the Doubting Thomases.
But as of last night, I think we did something very significant. We have to remember, our journey to last night's historic vote was long, but it will always be remembered for the leadership of Mayor Deegan and her team. Also amazing work of Mark Lamping and his team. Not to be overlooked, the passionate support from the fans, residents and business owners throughout Duval County.
This day and tomorrow is yours. Never doubt Jacksonville.
With that, it's my distinct honor to introduce with my gratitude, mayor of Jacksonville, Donna Deegan.
DONNA DEEGAN: My goodness, what a great exhale today is. What a wonderful day. Thank you so much, Shad. I am so incredibly grateful. The entire city is grateful for your belief in Jacksonville and the significant investments that you're making in our community.
A billion dollars so far, folks, no joke. Pretty impressive. I hope you all believe now, as Shad said, I think it's so important that we cannot make that point enough: Jacksonville very often has had a bit of an inferiority complex. Let's believe in ourselves. Shad believes in us. The Jaguars believe in us. Hopefully the evidence of this agreement is that we are going to make this a successful partnership for many decades to come.
This is really an exciting day for our city. As Shad said, it's been a very long time in coming. So I, too, want to add my thanks. Shad, Mark, the entire Jaguars team, I cannot even begin to tell you how hard everybody worked. You have been a dream, an absolute dream to work with.
We knew the vision that we wanted to get to. We knew we wanted to get to 'yes'. We started off saying we both wanted to get to 'yes'. We worked very hard together to make that happen.
I'm also very grateful for the diligent work of our chief negotiator Mike Weinstein. I told Mike that last couple of weeks before we closed out the agreement, it's going to be a great chapter in one of our books. We're going to call it 'Burn the Ships' because we basically went to the negotiating team, Mark knows, all of us together, said, There's no turning back, we have set the deadlines, we are going to get there and we're going to get there together.
Boy, I tell you, Mike did an amazing job. I'm so grateful for him. Grateful to the office of general counsel. As I said yesterday, I should send them flowers every day for a month. Grateful for my staff's tireless efforts. Never stopped working hard to get this across the finish line. Darnell Smith, I'll tell you what, he made sure that we kept our foot on the gas. Failure was not an option. It really did take all of us.
It shows what is possible to do when we are all united and rowing in the same direction, towards a common goal that benefits our entire city.
I can't leave the city council out of that. Ron Salem and the city council took the timeline, too. They said, Let's drive to this, make sure we do it. It's not easy to get 19 people to work together in a fashion that's that concerted and focused and quick. They did that. It really was a team effort to make all this happen.
I'll never forget that moment when I was on the anchor desk and we announced what I thought to be the impossible, what a lot of us thought to be the impossible, that is that Jacksonville got its team 30 years ago. What an amazing night.
Last night's vote by the city council and this gathering today will forever be etched into my memory, just like that night 30 years ago. This is just as big a deal what we have today.
Mark has also said many times over the past year if we just build the stadium of the future we will have missed a big opportunity. So I'm grateful that the Jaguars partner with us on a once-in-a-generation community benefits agreement. We got some of that investment passed last night and we remain committed to finishing the job when the city council reconvenes in July.
Together we are turning renderings into reality for the betterment of Jacksonville because of the people in this room. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I just think it's time to make it official. What do you say, Shad? Do you want to sign something in let's go sign our names here on our proclamation?
(Document signed.)
THE MODERATOR: We'll talk a lot this fall about the 30th season. We'll spend a lot of time looking back at the last 30 years, which this is the beginning of the looking forward to the next 30 years in north Florida.
Mindful that we all have greater exposures and some one on ones later, we're going to conduct a somewhat abbreviated six - or seven-question Q&A right now.
Q. Mr. Kahn, when you bought the team, you probably knew at some point it was going to come to this day where you either have a deal or you wouldn't. Can you talk about when you first bought the team, were you already thinking about what the stadium of the future might be, and as far as the outcome, how the reality before you today may have compared to what you had envisioned might happen years ago as you reached this point, because it had to be one thing or the other, you either had a deal or not for staying in Jacksonville?
SHAD KHAN: Okay, so, I mean, you got to remember when I got here 12 years ago, 12-plus years ago, we had a lot of challenges. The first thing we had was, how do we make the team sustainable really for the long haul, really from business aspect, other aspects.
As time went on, it was very evident that we needed a stadium. We needed facilities. I think what you see sitting here is a great example of that, the private-public partnership. This is a small market. Really the public-private partnership is what makes it work or doesn't make it work.
Early on really the city was very helpful when we did some upgrades in the stadium right here. I've always been optimistic that we will figure out a way to have a long-term solution.
Now, the stadium, my goal was that we want to have a stadium that is state-of-the-art, will really sustain for the long haul, be an icon for the city, lead to economic growth.
There have been challenges here over the past of how do we bridge all those, bring people together. But really architecturally be something that is very significant, and no compromises.
With the public-private partnership, it's really important that we don't waste the city's money, and frankly we're not wasting my money, okay? So our interests were aligned, yet be no compromises.
Some of the things that really have not been talked about, the stadium process started probably four years ago - Mark can elaborate on that - when we did the surveys, what people want. I've been an architecture buff all my life. That originally is what really had attracted me to Chicago, Frank Lloyd Wright. I was even in architecture school my freshman year till I found out what they make, so I thought I better switch to engineering (smiling).
But really that's been kind of a nighttime hobby for me to look at the stadiums. So the process we went through, we hired eight of the best architects. We paid them. Mark led the effort. We got all the ideas. We threw our ideas. We got it down to two. We paid them again.
To me, in this day and age, you got to have a great product, an icon that represents the city, but it really has to be environmentally very green.
Like the Coliseum, I'm a huge fan in Rome. It's 2000 years old. Parts of it work today, some of the sight lines, some of the things they did. Our goal was we don't want to do the usual approach, which is we can't afford it anyway. A lot of times the best decisions are when you're limited with time and money. The worst is when you have unlimited time and money.
Using the bowl, which is lower bowl here, perfect condition. Reusing the scoreboards that were state-of-the-art, the city paid for them, we paid for them. Lowering them, fitting them in without compromises.
Roof, but yet we don't have to worry about snow loads, some of the things. We wanted it cool without air-conditioning, environmentally responsible using the winds that are predictable in Jacksonville, how to cool. Some of the environmental issues on pollution and what have you. Concrete is a big polluter. Being able to use parts that exist.
I think when it's all said and done, besides the design, the bang for the buck the city's getting is going to be over the top. I think, if anything, it's going to show how you can achieve a lot with very little.
Long answer, but we have kind of lived this thing here as the Jaguars over the last really five years. It's very well thought out, with a lot of time and effort.
I don't think I'll get another one with the long answers (smiling).
Q. Mayor Deegan, as a Jacksonville resident, what does it mean to you to be the mayor that oversaw this project coming to its completion and will remain an icon?
DONNA DEEGAN: It's an incredibly proud moment. That's all I can say. Obviously I knew coming in this would be something we would be dealing with. It became a top focus, wanting to get moved through it as efficiently and quickly as possible, getting the best deal for all involved. Fortunately Mark and Shad were on that same page. Mike was a fantastic negotiator.
For me personally, it's just a real point of pride that not only were we able to bring this in for a landing and have the Jaguars be with us for 30 more years, but all that portends for the rest of the city as we look to grow our downtown and create the type of city we all really want to have and believe we should have.
Very proud today and frankly relieved to get it over the finish line.
Q. Mr. Kahn, you mentioned the Weavers throughout this process. The board behind you says, We did it again. Have you confided with him, talked with the Weavers throughout this process at all?
SHAD KHAN: They were aware of what we were doing. Since the vote, I've not been able to talk to him. We did text him, We did it again. Obviously his legacy will live forever.
But regrettably I didn't talk to him this morning, but I tried.
Q. Mr. Kahn, I can't handle all the big numbers up here, but I do know sports, and I haven't had you on camera since the signing of No. 16. I'm curious about that negotiation, and having Trevor along with this stadium, pretty good coach as well going forward with your franchise?
SHAD KHAN: Yeah, I think you need all of that. I think we're sitting in this building, you're looking at that. Expectation should be up, too, that for us winning, winning now, is an expectation.
Obviously I've talked to Trevor a lot over the last few years. Really the COVID year before the draft. I think he represents the city, he represents the Jaguars. Couldn't ask for anyone better.
Obviously I was hoping that would get done before this, and I'm glad it did get done, so...
Q. Mr. Kahn, how did the lessons of Lot J and previous development attempts spur the renovation to get across the line? What were some of the lessons from those challenges that helped in this negotiation?
SHAD KHAN: Mark?
MARK LAMPING: I think we learned that we're going to control our own dialogue, that we're not going to allow an advocate of ours, in this case it was all well-meaning, but Lot J, the narrative was really controlled by the mayor's office. We didn't get the result by a vote of 12 to 7, I remind you, did not get the vote.
We decided coming out of that, if we're going to fail, we want to make sure that we're failing through our own dialogue and not looking and saying, I wish this third party would have done something differently.
There was a lot of positive things that came out of that. Had some very honest discussions with key people, David Miller being one of them. Some of the people that are the biggest opponents of Lot J, Councilman Carlucci, as well, really were great counsels to me personally going forward. Not surprisingly, both in the case, there's many others I could name, those two became two of the bigger cheerleaders for first the shipyards project, approved less than 12 months after Lot J, then subsequently the stadium.
Probably the biggest thing we learned is if we're going to fail, let's make sure we fail under our plan, not under somebody else executing under their plan.
Before we get out of here, after first four or five rows, a lot of the focus is on me because I was the point person on this. But there are literally hundreds of Jag employees that are here today that all played a role in that. Shad recognizes that, I recognize that. I want to make sure you all got it appropriate. So thanks to all of you.
THE MODERATOR: Well-said. Thank you.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports