MLS Expansion - St. Louis stadium gets additional city funding

The Collinsville City Council has approved a TIF plan to help pay for the proposed 400-acre stadium site. The hope is this will help the St. Louis soccer group find the additional investors needed to bring a MLS team to the area. For those wondering, a TIF plan is basically a loan to oneself against the projected increased tax income from a public project.

This is yet another sign of the desire for Collinsville to land a team, but with recent news out of Pennsylvania, it might be a little too late.

The irony of all this is if St. Louis put a bid like this as recently as three years ago, they would probably already be fielding a team. The league has progressed to a point where they can be more selective (or down right demanding) about where they land teams, and this is a good thing. Although I would love to see a team in St. Louis, if it is true that the group does not have the investments needed to make it a success, I can fully understand why the league would not expand there at this time.

That said, Jeff Cooper seems like that exact type of person the league needs to move into the next level. He has the energy and local ties plus is a smart businessman, now he just needs a little extra money to make it happen.