The United States Soccer Federation plans to use bond financing to raise most of the funds needed to build its new National Training Center and headquarters in Fayette County.
The county’s development authority will issue $200 million in tax-exempt bonds later in August on behalf of the sports organization, allowing investors to buy the municipal debt and provide U.S. Soccer with its construction financing. The bonds make up the majority of incentives that state and local officials offered the federation to woo U.S. Soccer to metro Atlanta.
Niki Vanderslice, president and CEO of the Fayette County Development Authority, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that taxpayers “are not on the hook” for repaying the bonds. She added that the bonds began pricing Thursday and were oversubscribed by prospective investors, showing strong demand.
“That just shows the significance of the project and U.S. Soccer’s commitment to the plans that are moving forward,” she said.
Credit: U.S. Soccer
Credit: U.S. Soccer
The bonds will be secured by the deed on the training facility and a lien on gross revenues from the federation’s sponsorship and media contracts, ticket sales and game-day revenue, according to Bloomberg, which first reported on the bonds in July.
The bonds are rated BBB by Fitch Ratings, two steps above speculative grade. Bond documents obtained by Bloomberg show the federation expects to generate $193 million in revenue during the 2024 fiscal year, and Fitch noted that its rating was constrained because of “the relatively limited but growing fan base of U.S. Soccer and the sport of soccer’s status domestically.”
U.S. Soccer announced its Fayette plans in December, purchasing a 200-acre site to the west of Veterans Parkway and north of Trilith Studios. A news release from Gov. Brian Kemp’s office estimated the value of the project at $228 million.
Arthur Blank, the Atlanta business owner and philanthropist who owns the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United, donated $50 million to the project. Chick-fil-A Chairman Dan Cathy and Atlanta-based Coca-Cola also made financial commitments to the training facility.
The future facility will feature more than a dozen soccer fields and 200,000 square feet of offices. U.S. Soccer will shift its operations to Fayette after more than three decades in Chicago.
Credit: U.S. Soccer
Credit: U.S. Soccer
In addition to the donations and municipal debt, U.S. Soccer is set to receive about $7 million in other incentives for the project, according to bond documents obtained by Bloomberg. The Federation is also eligible to receive a 10-year property-tax abatement from the county.
Vanderslice said those tools, but especially the ability to issue tax-exempt debt, are vital to attracting investment of this scope.
“It’s a great tool in our toolbox for being able to work with projects of significance like the U.S. Soccer Federation,” she said.
Construction broke ground in April, and U.S. Soccer aims to open the facility before the 2026 World Cup, which includes Atlanta as a host city.
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