The St. Petersburg City Council met this morning and approved cash toward repairs to Tropicana Field’s roof. This vote specifically approved $22.5 million which will be for the fabrication of the roof material in Germany, its transport to China for assembly, and then its installation in St. Pete.
The city counceilers were in broad agreement that allocating the money to repair the roof was necessary for the city to fulfil it’s contractural obligation to make Tropicana Field playable — an obligation that they understood would also include further interior repairs that have yet to be fully priced.
The lone dissenting vote came from Counceilmember Richie Floyd, a long-time stadium spending skeptic, who said that he understood the contractual obligation but that he wanted to see a price comparison between repairs and a settlement with the Rays that would buy them out of the use agreement.