By admin The financial terms of Rancho Cordova’s proposed indoor soccer arena development are coming into focus as the project heads to the Planning Commission on Wednesday for votes on its design, development agreement and the proposed sale of city land.
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The arena and plaza are expected to cost $175 million to $225 million to build. The total cost of the larger development near Kilgore Road and Trade Center Drive — which would include housing, hotels, retail, dining, a card room and what would be the city’s only movie theater — could reach $1 billion to $2 billion.
City officials confirmed they are considering waiving certain fees and potentially sharing some of the tax revenues generated by the development. A new city staff report estimates Rancho Cordova’s total financial participation could reach about $185 million over 35 years, largely through performance-based incentives tied to the project.
Exactly how much Rancho Cordova ultimately contributes — and in what form — remains unsettled. The staff report does not break down the estimate among fee waivers, city-paid development fees, tax sharing and other incentives.
City officials stress that much of that participation would come only after the development is built and generating revenue.
Other funding mechanisms, mentioned in the city’s initial agreement with the developers last year, are still possible, City Manager Micah Runner said Thursday.
For the 7,500-seat arena, early city estimates anticipate Rancho Cordova may waive $1.5 million to $2 million in building permit fees and pay $7 million to $8 million from its general fund to cover development impact fees, city spokesperson Maria Kniestedt said in an email. That money would go to special funds for specific investments such as traffic mitigation and affordable housing.
The total fee waivers for the entire project — including the housing, hotels and card room — may range from $25 million to $40 million, according to a staff report released with the city’s original agreement with the developers last year. That range, Runner said Thursday, “probably still applies.”
As with the arena fee waivers, some of the amount includes fees the city would forgo, Kniestedt said, while some would involve transferring money from its general fund to other city accounts.
Those fee waivers are included in the city’s estimated $185 million in total financial participation, rather than being in addition to it, Kniestedt said. The $185 million also includes city-paid impact fees and potential agreements to share hotel, sales and card room tax revenues.
“Pretty much all of this transaction is built on performance,” Runner said. “It requires the developer to meet milestones and delivery points before that participation occurs.”
The first significant fee waiver would occur when developers submit a building permit, Kniestedt said. The next would come with the final inspections of different parts of the project, including the arena and hotels, when the city would pay impact fees.
The largest financial contribution would come after the project is completed through a 35-year tax-sharing agreement, which could include some portion of sales, hotel and card room tax revenues. The city also could pay supplemental public safety costs associated with the development for up to 15 years, according to the Planning Commission staff report.
The project is “not a publicly financed arena,” Runner said. But, he added, “that doesn’t mean there’s not city financial participation.”
The $185 million also includes city-paid impact fees and potential agreements to share hotel, sales and card room tax revenues.
Wood said in a message Sunday that most of the city’s contribution would come from tax revenues generated by the project after it is built.
“We’re building this for Rancho Cordova, and the structure was designed so the city and community shares in the upside without carrying the risk,” he wrote.
Councilmember ‘shocked’ by proposal
Joshua Wood, who worked with former Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson’s administration on the campaign to keep the Sacramento Kings in the city, founded KozPure with his business partner, Charanjeet Kaur Tiwana-Purewal, in late 2024, positioning the arena as the firm’s first significant project. They founded Alpha One Sports and Entertainment Group, the company that would own the property, in 2023.
By the time their aspirations became public one year ago, and the Major Arena Soccer League awarded the region a men’s and a women’s team, officials had mapped out potential funding mechanisms. The initial deal said the city would contribute land to the development, but Wood and Runner said last week that the group is now expected to buy the property at market rate.
The new staff report puts that price at $3.5 million.
At Wednesday’s meeting, commissioners also will consider recommending that the City Council find the project exempt from further environmental review under the California Environmental Quality Act. The City Council would likely discuss its finances in more depth a month or so later, Runner said.
Councilmember Linda Budge said Rancho Cordova’s leaders plan to ensure that “public dollars are spent wisely” and that the city gets a return on its investment. The return on the project, she said, is “unlimited” both financially and with the opportunities it brings to the city.
“You waive fees like this in order to get a project on the ground,” Budge said, though she did not say whether she was in favor of using general-fund dollars for fee waivers.
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Councilmember Joe Little said he believed other projects could be built at the proposed site without the level of financing the city is contemplating.
When the project was first presented, officials placed great emphasis on the idea that it would be privately funded, and Little said he was “shocked” by the fee waiver proposal.
“It’s not a good deal,” he said. With the exception of affordable housing, he added, “development should pay for itself.”
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Councilmember David Sander, meanwhile, argued that the city is in good financial health.
“I don’t want to say it’s a small amount of money, because it isn’t. It’s a substantial amount of money,” he said. “But we are so fiscally healthy, it’s not a burden for us, undertaking a development proposal this way.”
The true measure of value for the community will be the effect on area tax revenues after the arena is built, said Patrick Rishe, executive director of the sports business program at Washington University in St. Louis. That will depend in part on the arena’s design, whether there are similar facilities in the region, and whether it can attract events that bring in out-of-town visitors to spend money at restaurants, shops and hotels.
“These things are hard to parse out,” Rishe said. “Economic impact studies are forecasts, and not the actual spending and tax data. Really, the proof is in the pudding, but the pudding you’re not going to see until months and years after the facility is built.”
Where is Rancho Cordova’s downtown?
The arena project has been the subject of extensive discussion among city residents and leaders, some of whom view it as a chance to establish a central gathering place for the city. Since its inception, several of the city’s leaders have voiced support and argued that the development may deliver Rancho Cordova the makings of a downtown, a feature the city lacks.
“Suburbs everywhere have this problem: ‘Where’s downtown?’” Sander said.
Budge said she was “truly” in support at a meeting last year. Budge has represented Rancho Cordova since the city incorporated in 2003 and is running for re-election in the 5th District, where the arena would be located. Mayor Garrett Gatewood erupted with cheers at the City Council meeting where the project was first introduced. The development would be transformative for the city, he said, and Wood’s work was “a blessing.”
“We’re now on the map,” Gatewood previously said. “This is going to change our city forever.”
In February, the City Council approved $940,000 in development fee waivers for the project’s design review application, an environmental consultant and the city attorney’s work on development agreements, among other things. In August, the City Council approved additional funding for traffic analysis from its general fund, raising the total cost to $128,000 from $88,000.
The agreement from last year — and officials in interviews last week — leave open the possibility of other funding mechanisms, including an enhanced infrastructure financing district, or EIFD, which can use expected increases in property tax revenue to finance eligible infrastructure costs.
Runner said the project is being treated as exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act.
City planning staff is recommending that commissioners agree, concluding that the development would not create significant environmental effects beyond those already analyzed in Rancho Cordova’s 2006 general plan environmental review.
‘As fast as we could’
KozPure had planned to break ground in early 2026 and build the arena in time to host games in late 2027. This week, Wood said his firm hopes to break ground by year’s end, so the arena may host its first games in the first quarter of 2028. That timeline, Wood added, assumes the agreements with the city remain largely similar to the framework approved last September.
Despite the delays, the developers have made multiple announcements in recent months about the district’s future.
A 30-second commercial premiered during the 2026 FIFA World Cup in June, showing clips from Sacramento sports history and saying that “a championship legacy returns.” At the time, KozPure said it expected to announce a team name and logo later this year.
On Thursday, KozPure announced Chef Math as its food and beverage advisor for the district. Its partners, Bart Madden and Santana Diaz, would “shape the culinary strategy across Downtown Dova,” according to a news release.
“We pushed as fast as we could,” Wood said in an interview, “and we’re glad that hopefully we’re going to planning commission now.”
The Rancho Cordova Planning Commission meeting is slated for 5:30 p.m. Wednesday at City Hall, 2729 Prospect Park Drive.
This story was originally published September 28, 2026 at 6:00 AM with the headline “Rancho Cordova arena could get millions in city support. How the deal would work.”
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