Card Now let's continue. This is one of the great weekends in the history of Cincinnati when it comes to sports. So much going on. Of course tonight is the Cardinals against the Bearcats at Heritage Bank Arena. And then also tonight's a little game between Elder and Saint X and I'd say Rocky Boyman and maybe Jeff Birding showing disrespect to Elder, not in his case, but in Rocky's case. He stepped on the flag that Elder gave me two or three years ago. Rocky Boyman did. Then you got
UC Bearcat football against BYU. Then you got the Bengals, Bengals and the Patriots going. Then you got Messy at five o'clock on Sunday trying to get a win against FC. Joining me now is the President, CEO and chief bottlewasher of FC. That is Jeff Birding and Jeff Birning. Welcome again to the Bill Cunningham Show. And Jeff, first of all, just in a general way, this came together out of nowhere. I don't think anybody saw all these events transpire. How
unusual is it in Cincinnati? Did these events going on, including the Midies, including the Bluebirds, all playing high school football Trotwood Anderson. Isn't this special to be a Cincinnatian.
It is. We love our sports, and we love our teams who represent us, and you know, it brings people together. It makes it more fun to live here. And I'll be down at pay Court tonight for Elder Saint X and I got my Bengals season tickets and you know, and then yeah, FC Cincinnati will take on the messy Mountain of Enter Miami on Sunday at five.
Before we talk about MESSI and FC, there was a proposal a few days ago from the city Council to buy a plot of land right by w C eighteen forty eight. I know you have a hope, maybe a plan, maybe in the distance to build an arena there. We need a brand new arena. Everyone says that is that part of that plan or not not directly.
What I would say, Bill is, you know, when I was on city council obviously fifteen plus years ago, we took possession of the block at Fifth and Race, and I thought, if we ever got controlled the Millennium, you could put an arena there, because at some point we're going to need to replace the arena on the Riverfront, put a hotel on top of it, tied into the convention Center, and that'd be a great development. I left
city Council and the new group. That's where eighty four fifty one is, and that's no longer a potential site for an arena. And so I think what the mayor and council and the Port Authority have done here is to say, listen, this parcel the old freestore food bank that was offices that were abandoned a couple of years ago. It's an empty building. There's going to be something great that we're going to build on this site, tied into the town Center garage. So now the public has full
control of the site. The arena study has said that this is one of the best sites for a future arena. It's not the only one. There's other options, but it is one of them, and we need to preserve public control so that some speculator done by the property and then hold this community up for tens of millions of dollars, which is what the experience was, as you know, with the Millennium, and put it in a position where the arena couldn't go there because someone is holding this community up.
So I think they showed good foresight to say, listen, we just want to put the site under public control. If it's an arena, fine, If it's not, it'll be a residential or commercial development of some sort that capitalizes on all the energy and success and over the line and what we're doing up at our stadium. This is a great site, and we want to make sure the public can control it.
So you and Carl Linder control that large part of those parcels, along with four hundred million dollars of development happening as I speak, and so is wouldn't you prefer to have the brand new arena close to FC and TQL.
To be fair, We're sure we would because you got music Hall. We've invested in this community probably close to a billion dollars since we formed three CDC in two thousand and three. Over the last twenty years. You could offer that, you know, it's a pretty successful, vibrant entertainment district that combines a lot of the heritage of Cincinnati and the preserved architecture of Cincinnati's founding with a lot of really great new things that we're building up around it.
And so you could offer this would be a very dynamic site. And I think the arena study that the Chamber of Commerce led concluded that this is a very viable site where the town Center garage is. But to be fair, there's a couple other opportunities that will be evaluated and Phil Castellini and I and Phil has his own vision about maybe keeping it on the existing side if that could work. Where he and I one hundred percent agree is this community needs to replace an obsolete
arena on the riverfront. Everyone who's listening knows that we we all get in our cars and we go to Indy or Columbus or Lexington or Louisville to go to concerts, to go to shows and people and people send me the pictures of their experiences at the existing arena, and it feels unsafe and it is very obsolete. And in my opinion, that's what losing looks like. That's not what winning looks like. And so we need to solve this, and Phil and I agree, and so let's come up
with based on Steve leapers and work. Steve's been asked by the city in the County three CDC to come up with a plan on how we can fund a new arena. Some private some public, and that work needs to continue and we need to all be joining hands to say that's the priority. How can we pay for this and come up with a plan that people feel, including everyone listening. Yeah, you know what, that seems pretty reasonable. Okay, we get a new arena out of this. We don't get to go. I have to get in our cars
and other people get in their cars and come to Cincinnati. Again, that's winning. Then there will be a process side where the arena should go, and then Bill will assert his plan and we with others the city will assert ours. But that's premature. We shouldn't be debating the site right now. We should be coming together to say we need a plan that allows us to replace a very obsolete arena on the riverfront.
You know, that's like Masters of the Universe. On one hand, you have the Castellinis, you have the banks, You have the interest of CBD Downtown, the Central Business District, against the lenders and against the farmers and against the Birdings and against TQL. So you have on one site. You got get it on the banks. I know Jim Mooring wants it there. Castellini's won it there. The Bengals won
it there. On the other hand, you have the lenders, the farmers, the meg Whitman's, the tqls, the birdings want it up that way. This will be interesting to watch when will be concluded. I want to see the masters of the universe butt heads.
To see for the next six months, we come up with a Bible plan where there's public hearings, public buy in, there will be government approvals, all of that will need to say we can do this. Then once that consensus has been established around the plan again with public hearings, then there will need to be a process on okay, now, what's the best place to build it? And I am confident that we'll come up with a process. And at the end of the day, Bill, I know you know this.
I'm a Cincinnati guy. I want to see a new arena. If the best plan is to put it on the riverfront, you know, that's great, we get a new arena. If the best is to put it next door to over the Rhine of Music Hall and all the great entertainment and history of Cincinnati up in our neck of the woods, then that's great. But at the end of the day, what I don't want is that we continue to lose out as a community because we have among the top
fifty cities in this country the worst arena. How are we going to bring the best talent, How are we going to bring more jobs, more popular? How are we going to be winning as a community when such a visible thing our arena is the worst of the top fifty cities in the country. Again, I'm tired of losing. I want to see us winning.
Bill the new Duke Energy Center supposed to open in January, I believe there's no hotel attacks to it. A little birdie told me that the Port Authority had difficulty getting financing from the Maria Group's going to operate it. But why is there not a big hotel opening along with the convention center.
Well, I think the short is is that this three CDC has done excellent work advancing the convention center modernization. That work, that plan came together quickly, it was much less money, and we obviously went to work right away because we don't have a functional convention center right now until the work is done at the beginning part of twenty six. The hotel much more complicated, you know, an eight seven hundred and fifty eight hudred room hotel is
much much more extensive. If there's some different financing pieces, some of the pieces involved the state, these things are just a little bit more challenging. My belief, Bill, is that we will have an announcement again led by three CDC in our you know, the city and the county here very soon on the hotel, and then that construction work will commence.
That's going to be years away, years away.
Probably at least twenty four months. Twenty four months is I think what it will take. So if we could get under way in early twenty six and you're talking about opening in early twenty eight, well.
The convention center can't rip and roar until there's an attached, brand new hotel. It's just done work by itself. Now let's talk about soccer for a moment.
What can I tell you, Bill, Sorry real quick, but you know what, once the cranes go up, you're telling groups. You're recruiting these groups to come to your convention center for big conventions a couple of years out anyway, Once the cranes go up, then you're showing a level of confidence and certainty to groups you're recruiting to come here and to bring their groups and to bring the people that are spent a lot of money, you have something to sell them for two years down the line anyway.
Well, and then also, isn't it true that financing has been a problem.
I think there's a lot of these final details. I would tell you. I think most of this deal, eighty ninety percent of the deal has been done for some time, and the final ten percent, as you know, is always the hardest.
All right, let's talk about MESSI six or seven years ago, eight years ago, when I was with you and Gerber the commission at UC campus, there was a dream. I think the final vote on city Council was five to four, could have gone the other way, could have been four to five. If that went the other way, then we wouldn't have a franchise, There wouldn't be a TQL, there wouldn't be a convention center possibly there. There wouldn't be
five hundred million dollar development happening as I speak. When you look back on that, do you kind of amuse by the fact that at least four members of council did not want to change zoning. Isn't that amazing?
You know it is, But I'm not much of a look back guy. At the end of the day, we got it done. I'm focused on what do we still need to build, what do we still need to achieve as a community. At the end of the day, you know, there were some people who maybe didn't quite see the vision the way we saw it. I assure you that can I've talked to a bunch of them. You know they see it now. And that's all that really matters is people see that this has been a tremendous shot in the arm for our community.
In the West End. Community Council is for it. Talk to me about Messy one hundred, talk about that because this argument because you when someone has to lose, that's not true.
No. Look, I went door to door in the West End and listen and to hear what their concerns were. We did our the first ever community benefits agreement because to be fair, change had never been good for residents of the West End. They had suffered from decades of disinvestment in decline. I've said this, you know, I was on City Council for six years. I don't call a single meeting where we even talked about the West End. And so you know, we've delivered. We've and in return.
We've earned their trust and we're good neighbors and they're good neighbors to us, and it's been a great thing. Our mixed use development, which was approved by the City Planning Commission today unanimously, approved by the West End Community Council unanimously, was approved in its first iteration largely still the same by City Council unanimously. I mean, that's pretty rare these days in politics.
Two winners, not a loser, and a winter. Lastly, about Messy. If somebody could have told you five or six years ago that MESSI would come to TQL at five o'clock on Sunday and actually get beaten by FC, you would not have believed it. It was impossible. He'd be like you signing Ronaldo, which is still down the road, I hope. Talk about the historical aspects of the greatest of all time coming to the West End to play soccer against your team.
Talk about that, well, The thing I would say is people need to appreciate that soccer is the biggest sport in the world. It's not in our country, of course, football is in the history of baseball, but it is and this weekend, the biggest soccer game on the planet is in Cincinnati at Tiquo Stadium, because the whole world is watching to see if Cincinnati sends Messi and Miami home.
And you know, there's two legends of Barcelona, Sergio Busquettes and Jordi Alva, that have been playing with Messi these last couple of years at Miami. They announced the retirement at the end of the regular season, so this could be their last game. And you know, we have fared very well against Miami. We didn't lose to them this year. We have it in our two games. We didn't even concede a goal to them. We match up with them pretty well. Obviously, they have some of the best players
and with Messi probably the goat. And so it's going to be a great environment. We still have a few tickets, but ultimately it'll be sold out. It's going to be you know, a lot of fireworks, a lot of music, some incredible fan energy and of course Bill worldlie.
No question, all right, give our best to the Lender family. They're suffering and at this point, your family like that needs compliments and warmth and they need a big thank you. I could not imagine our communities without the Lender families participating and giving so much over these decades. And once again, Jeff Birding, it's a big weekend in sports. It's all going to be five o'clock on Sunday at the end. And may God bless you, and God bless the Lender
family and Jeff Birding. Thank you, very thank you, God bless you, thank you. Let's continue with more if a line becomes available five one, three, seven, four, nine, seven thousand. I don't know too many communities anywhere in the world that has this lineup of activities, including the Jonas Brothers. I know Jeff Birding is a great fan of the
Jonas Brothers. I think they're playing tonight. But to have all this happening coming together is a testament to all of the kind of community that we can be in the count of community that we are. And I could not imagine the Old West End not having these developments. The last five or six or seven years. It was right down and the Crapper. And at this point it's win win win every which way. And if you have time, drive through Central Parkway take a look at what's happening
adjacent to TQL Stadium. A four hundred million dollar investment and to have on one side of the ring the Castellini's and Jim Mooring and the John Barretts and the Procter and Gambles and the Bengals saying we want the new Indoor Stateument to be here. On the other side, you have the lenders, you have Meg Whitman, you have the farmers, you have the Jeff birdingsd the TQL saying no, we want it over here, and the masters of the
universe will decide what to do. Let's continue with more and so much to do in the tries did over the next few days. I think to an extent, we criticize ourselves so much, but the world has his eyes trained on Cincinnati this weekend, and I'm picking Elder to kick ass tonight, all on news radio seven hundred WLW