Inside Metropolitan Park: How Steve Cohen Got His $8 Billion Casino Project Approved in New York
Steve Cohen’s vision for Metropolitan Park faced lawsuits, objections, and intense competition. Here’s how the Mets owner ultimately secured approval for New York’s most ambitious casino project.
Five years after buying his childhood team for an MLB record $2.4 billion, hedge fund billionaire and New York Mets owner Steve Cohen is ready to take his next big swing.
On Monday, the New York State Gaming Commission unanimously awarded Cohen one of the state’s three downstate casino licenses. In exchange for a 30-year casino operating license, Cohen will pay a $500 million upfront fee (and an estimated $850 million in annual tax revenue back to the state) just for the right to spend another $8.1 billion on an entertainment complex located in the parking lot surrounding Citi Field.
The thesis is simple: MLB teams are seasonal businesses. The Mets generate revenue from media rights, tickets, concessions, merchandise, and sponsorships, but all of that money is earned during the season. So by converting an area that generates minimal recurring revenue today — the parking lot — into a year-round casino and hospitality complex, the Mets can reduce seasonality, increase foot traffic, and generate exponentially higher returns by diversifying the use of an asset they already own.
Several sports teams are already doing this, including the Atlanta Braves, Milwaukee Bucks, New England Patriots, and Texas Rangers. But if Cohen pulls off what he is attempting, the Mets’ real estate project will make the others look like child’s play.
Wait, New York City Is Getting Casinos?
Yes, you read that right. New York voters actually approved an amendment allowing up to seven full-scale casinos on non-tribal land back in 2013. The first four casino licenses were awarded upstate, with those properties given a 10-year head start so they could get up and running before downstate casinos cannibalized their business.
Once that 10-year period expired, the New York State Gaming Commission turned its attention to New York City. With three casino licenses up for grabs across NYC, Long Island, and Westchester, about a dozen operators expressed interest. After a few rounds of vetting, that list turned into a party of eight — three bids from Manhattan, one in Yonkers, one in the Bronx, two in Queens, and one on Coney Island.
I’m not going to go through every step of the approval process because half of you will fall asleep, but what you need to know is that each of these potential casino projects had to gain regulatory approval from a local Community Advisory Committee (CAC).
The CAC is essentially a mix of local elected officials, civic leaders, and area residents who vote to determine whether your project is in the best interests of residents and businesses. Casino operators present their plan and argue for their vision at two separate hearings, with a majority vote of approval required for the project to proceed.
As you can imagine, this process gets super political. In fact, only 50% of the groups interested in acquiring a downstate casino license gained CAC approval. Manhattan’s CACs voted against every single casino proposal inside the city due to concerns over traffic and the potential adverse effects on Broadway’s theaters, while Coney Island’s CAC shut down a $3.4 billion proposal by Thor Equities via a 4-2 vote in September.
Steve Cohen’s Metropolitan Park proposal also faced plenty of roadblocks along the way. Senator Jessica Ramos (representing the district) initially opposed the bill and even refused to introduce it. The USTA also filed a lawsuit and successfully obtained a temporary restraining order, arguing that the project would breach its contract with the state by disrupting parking services during the 23-day US Open. And if that wasn’t bad enough, Cohen and his partners also had to convince the state to convert the parking lot surrounding Citi Field from parkland into a commercial development.
We are all adults here, so I’m not going to pretend like this entire process is done by the book. While it’s true that Cohen and his partners hired expensive lobbying firms and spent thousands of hours and millions of dollars meeting with residents to quell their concerns, it’s also true that Cohen and his partners donated to local politicians, hired lawyers from the Mayor’s office to work on the deal, and even agreed to fund a complete renovation of the Mets-Willets Point 7 subway station. I’ll let you decide what factors ultimately got the deal done, but it’s probably a combination of both.