The City of Dallas wants to keep the current professional sports franchises in north Texas and is looking for ways to attract new ones. The city's Committee on Professional Sports Recruitment and Retention held its first meeting at City Hall on Tuesday.
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson put the government spotlight on pro sports earlier this year when he called for Dallas to get an NFL expansion team.
He noted that the Dallas Cowboys actually play in Arlington and have their headquarters in Frisco - not Dallas.
During the first committee meeting, members of the City Council got a report on the economic impact of the American Airlines Center and the surrounding Victory Park development.
"This is a real industry - just like telecommunications or health care or manufacturing, and there are billions of dollars associated with this industry that our city could benefit from." Mayor Johnson said.
He urged his fellow Council Members to begin work now on attracting new teams to the area, noting that such agreements can take years to work out.
"If we ever want to see Major League Baseball played in the City of Dallas downtown, if you ever want to see Major League Soccer played downtown, if you ever want to see a second NFL team...those are not the types of deals that come together in a couple of years. They take decades - ten, twenty years maybe, to make happen. So we are starting now the work of laying the foundations for those conversations to be very, very feasible conversations in the years to come," he said.
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