The long hours of discussions between City Manager John Shirey, County Administrator David Krings and their staffs still were being translated into precise legal language Friday, so no final document was available for review.
County commissioners scheduled a 2 p.m. meeting today to approve the agreement; city council scheduled a similar meeting for 4 p.m. today at City Hall.
''We have an agreement in principle,'' Hamilton County Commission President Tom Neyer Jr. said, cautioning, ''Until we have a deal signed, there is no deal.''
A majority of city council expressed its support.
Mayor Roxanne Qualls and council members Dwight Tillery, Bobbie Sterne and Charlie Winburn say that they - along with Phil Heimlich, who couldn't attend - will vote for the deal.
''There is a lot more to this than just a sports deal,'' said Mr. Shirey, who attended a news conference with councilmembers. ''This is about the future of Cincinnati and how we develop our riverfront. Frankly, I'm proud of the stance we've taken.''
Said Mrs. Sterne: ''I'm delighted that we have finally reached this point.''
Bengals President Mike Brown, who threatened to kill a stadium deal if not finalized by today, said he won't relax until city council passes the resolution.
''I feel good about it,'' Mr. Brown said.
It became clear Friday that Joseph A. Pichler, Kroger Co. chairman and CEO, was instrumental in brokering the deal by arranging negotiations Thursday with all the parties.
The meeting was arranged hastily Thursday morning and began shortly before lunch. With few breaks, the negotiations continued past midnight at Mr. Pichler's offices.
Mr. Pichler shunned media attention, adopting a typical behind-the-scenes profile of the powerful Cincinnati Business Committee he chairs. But Mr. Brown said the deal may have died if not for the intervention of Mr. Pichler.
''Joe is quite a remarkable person,'' Mr. Brown said. ''He's forceful. He's not afraid to say what's on his mind. But at the same time he is gracious and tactful. He played a huge role.''
Troy Blackburn, Bengals director of stadium development, said, ''Joe was able to force everybody to stay in the room, bargain in good faith and work out our disagreements. He knew there were times to push and times to listen.''
Mr. Neyer said Mr. Pichler ''punched it across the goal line.'' The Kroger chairman is friends with Ralph ''Mike'' Michel, the former PNC Bank chief who helped the Bengals in the early days of the club's stadium push before moving to PNC's corporate office in Pittsburgh.
The city-county talks began in July when city officials first raised concerns that the county had given the Bengals ''veto power'' over the entire riverfront in the team's stadium lease.
The city's trump card was its ability to kill the $400.3 million stadium project because it controls 12.5 acres in the heart of the stadium site.
Mr. Shirey refused to transfer the land until the city and county reached a riverfront development agreement.
The frantic pace of city-county negotiations in recent weeks was driven by the Jan. 31 deadline.
County leaders also set a Friday deadline for the deal, saying that tentative agreements the county had reached with produce vendors and railroad interests that lease the city-controlled land hinged on making the city deal by then.
But a county prosecutor assured commissioners that their deals with the produce vendors and railroad wouldn't collapse if the city-county deal is approved today instead.
Mr. Shirey gave council members a three-page summary of the tentative deal. Some of the elements were agreed upon earlier. According to the summary:
- Hamilton County will contribute $10 million to the city's $120.5 million overhaul of Fort Washington Way, the east-west connector. The city and county will split evenly the estimated $14 million cost of a new flood wall.
- The city will forgive the city portion of stadium property taxes for the life of the stadium (an estimated $1.4 million annually.)
- The city and county will split evenly the tax proceeds (for 10 years) and rent (for 20 years) generated by city developments on top of parking garages built in the land freed up by the Fort Washington Way project.
- The city gets land south of Mehring Way and adjacent to the John A. Roebling Suspension Bridge for parks in 2004 or when the county has had 36 months to build garages in the land freed up by Fort Washington Way and when 5,000 parking spaces are available for Bengals stadium use.
- Stadium events (other than Bengals games) may not coincide with major riverfront events, such as Riverfest and Tall Stacks. Those big community events would thereby have priority on the riverfront over other team events, such as soccer.
County Commissioner Bob Bedinghaus said the final deal will show that the city, county and Bengals all were ''willing to give a little bit. And all three parties had firm points.''
Ms. Qualls said the city had very clear objectives: amending the Bengals lease so the team didn't control the riverfront; cost-sharing agreements and a timetable for when land would be turned over for use in non-sports development.
''The agreement that Mr. Shirey has presented to the council (meets) the objectives we outlined,'' she said.
City Councilman Todd Portune said he thinks ''all parties have given a lot from where they originally were to get to this point.'' ''I believe that we will be worse off in the long run if this falls apart than if we go forward,'' he said.
Not all commissioners agree. County Commissioner John Dowlin, who will not be present for today's vote, urged the county to reject the deal. He argues that the city agreed long ago to make every effort to transfer the property with no strings attached.
''There obviously are strings attached,'' he said. ''The city is not living up to its agreement, and that is not ethical.''
He argued the county will be paying for more than $100 million of riverfront improvements, an ''onerous burden'' that the sales tax increase, passed to pay for stadium construction, was never intended to fund.
But Mr. Bedinghaus said improvements such as parking and infrastructure were part of what county leaders envisioned when they asked voters to increase the sales tax to build the stadiums and transform the riverfront.
City, county and team leaders say the complex negotiations took so long and went down to the wire in part because of intense distrust between the city and county and between the city and the Bengals. Mr. Shirey has used terms like ''treachery'' when referring to documents prepared by Bengals attorneys. Team official Jeff Berding referred to Mr. Shirey last week as the ''John Gotti'' of city politics for holding up the city land transfer to the county. Mr. Neyer said he knows there's been a ''high level of mistrust in both directions'' between the city and county.
''Part of what I hope to accomplish with this transaction is an improved atmosphere of trust and cooperation,'' he said this week. ''I believe that both city and county leaders are capable of that.''
But Mr. Portune said council's refusal to discuss the riverfront negotiations in public with the county and team don't help that relationship.
''I don't know how you develop a trusting relationship if you refuse to talk to each other,'' he said.
A key part of the deal involved the Bengals' ability to enforce the development guidelines over future riverfront development. The club made a concession by not putting the guidelines in the lease amendment, but they have a right to a say in the city-county agreement as a third-party beneficiary.
Mr. Blackburn said the club also ''tried to accommodate the city's flexibility to develop parcels adjacent to the stadium.''
One down, Reds to go
Still some loose ends
Chronology
More stories...
Photo page
