Residents and San Antonio City Council members scrutinized the city’s ballpark stadium deal with the ownership group of the minor league San Antonio Missions on Thursday over concerns about the displacement of low-income residents and indirect city funding for the project.
City officials and some members of the council continued to celebrate the proposed deal on Thursday, which they touted as coming with no city dollars and guaranteed economic development in the northwest section of downtown where the ballpark is proposed to be built.
But not everyone was on board.
“I moved into the Soap Factory apartments in November 2023 because I was homeless before that,” Luis Alvarado said during the public hearing’s public comment period. “And while a ballpark sounds like a nice thing, for me as a person of that community, it doesn’t seem like it’s something that’s caring for the community. Why would you be caring for the community when you’re kicking the community out?”
Alvarado said he doesn’t want to leave Soap Factory, and that he’s not convinced the housing navigation assistance that Urban Weston — the real estate developer that both owns the Soap Factory apartments and is on the Missions’ ownership group — has promised as part of their displacement plan will help him.
“I know for a fact that I would not be able to get somewhere else, and I would end up in the street yet again,” he said.
The displacement will not be required for the construction of the ballpark itself, but to make room for the economic development Weston Urban has promised around the stadium. The Missions need a new stadium because of new standards set by Major League Baseball (MLB) that the Missions’ current Nelson Wolff Stadium no longer meets.
Weston Urban has committed to offering residents displaced by phase one of economic development to move to another unit at the Soap Factory, and for all residents who will be displaced by phase two of economic development to be moved into affordable units at the Continental Block Hotel — also owned by Weston Urban — or to be given housing navigation assistance to find somewhere else to live.
Weston Urban CEO Randy Smith said on Thursday that his company took the displacement of its residents seriously.
“We realize that communication is paramount here,” Smith said. “And while this is not an affordable housing project and no one will have their lease terminated, we want to be clear-eyed that there are some difficult conversations coming about lease renewals. And I try to instill in my company a culture of empathy during tough conversations, and when we tackle those, we like to do so along the framework that we say bad news first, full disclosure, no surprises.”
Smith said his company has attempted — through email, the Soap Factory’s resident portal online, and the app NextDoor — to inform all of their residents of the possible coming displacement.
The Soap Factory is a market rate apartment complex downtown with studio rents as low as $682 and one-bedroom units as low as $765, a rarity in the area.
If the plan is approved, the first stage of economic development construction and stadium construction would begin in 2027.
Mike Phillips is a leader at Communities Organized for Public Service (COPS)/Metro Alliance, a grassroots organization that has been around in San Antonio for decades. He said the city needs to get the ownership group to commit to more before going ahead with the deal.
“Require the Missions ownership group to relocate all Soap Factory residents to equivalent affordable housing downtown and to include a $2,500 moving allowance,” Phillips said. “Require any rental housing created by the public TIRZ funding to include a provision for affordable housing equivalent to the Soap Factory apartments.”
City officials and members of the ownership group have said in order for the economic development to have the taxable value needed to pay for the project, all residential property that gets developed must be market rate.
District 8 Councilmember Manny Peláez, who is running for mayor, suggested that the Missions owners can move towards at least some of the COPS/Metro requests, though he didn’t request specific concessions.
“I’d encourage you guys to take that with you and study it,” he said. “These are not unreasonable requests.”
District 5 Councilmember Teri Castillo said approving a plan that involves the displacement of hundreds of residents does not align with the city’s own policies against using TIRZ funds for projects that involve resident displacement.
“So my question to my colleagues is why is this an exception and why are we not asking for more?” she asked at the dais. “Yesterday we had a very robust discussion and debate about unhoused individuals and here we are removing deeply affordable housing and it’s not even going to be replaced.”
A council session discussing the 2025 proposed budget for the city’s Department of Human Services on Wednesday included pushes from several council members to do more homeless encampment clearings and complaints that the city was not effectively addressing the issue of homelessness.
Castillo also said she had major concerns about how San Antonio tax dollars would ultimately end up supporting the project, despite all the comments from city and Missions officials saying they wouldn’t.
“Hearing the conversation and the questions asked — what I think is smoke and mirrors, smoke and mirrors — and the gymnastics in which the questions are asked to get [media] coverage that city dollars are not going towards this project is impressive,” District 5 Councilmember Teri Castillo said.
She said city tax dollars will be required in the form of SAPD staffing and overtime to heighten security in the area of the ballpark after it’s built.
She also said one of the backup mechanisms for paying for the project — tax revenue in the Houston Street Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone (TIRZ) that comes from properties on the west side of downtown which would be used in case the guaranteed development doesn’t generate the tax revenue expected — means that San Antonio tax dollars could be diverted to the ballpark project instead of on improvements in the area.
“I think it’s disingenuous to say no city dollars are going towards the construction of this project because if the TIRZ didn’t exist, those dollars would be captured by the city, and then can fund park improvements, streets and sidewalks, the things that my constituents call and ask me to invest in,” Castillo said.
San Antonio Chief Financial Officer Ben Gorzell said those TIRZ funds that are not generated by the development would only be used if half of the economic development was never constructed or if the second half of development didn’t generate enough taxable revenue expected — an outcome he doesn’t see as likely.
“There may be a small portion of it that would be funded from the existing Houston Street TIRZ, but that is a very conservative assumption,” he said.
Gorzell also said that even in that situation, 86% of the project’s $160 million cost would come from the Missions — $34 million in team revenue, a $1 million annual lease for use of the ballpark, and a $2 fee added to all tickets sold at the ballpark. The ownership group has also committed in writing to pay to make up for any difference in the expected taxable value of the first half of the economic development compared with what was anticipated.
Mayor Ron Nirenberg said the Missions stadium proposal is not a repeat of the failures of San Antonio’s past — when the Frost Bank Center, Alamodome, and Nelson Wolff Stadium’s promises of economic development fell flat.
“We have an area of downtown that is, for all practical purposes, blighted,” Nirenberg said. “That particular parcel [where the ballpark is planned to be built], nothing’s on it. We want it improved with a public amenity that we can all share, and we want the private developers to pay for it. In my view, we’ve checked all those boxes.
He added that in the event that Weston Urban’s housing navigators failed to help all of the Soap Factory residents find new housing, the city’s own housing navigators would step in.
The city council is scheduled to vote to approve the framework of the deal next week, though several members asked city staff to delay the vote for more time to receive resident feedback and for the ownership group to consider several requests regarding its resident displacement plan.
The Missions ownership group has an October 15 deadline set by the MLB to have this first framework approved by the city council.
