My good friend Dan Margolies, a former KC Star business reporter who now is an editor and reporter at KCUR, has an extremely informative follow-up today on yesterday’s big story regarding The Star breaking its long-term lease of the iconic printing plant it built for $200 million in the mid-2000s.
The Star’s story yesterday about its decision to relocate both its editorial and printing operations was full of holes. While the story laid out the basics — that the paper would vacate the building at 1601 McGee by the end of 2021 — it offered nothing about whether The Star was breaking its leaseback arrangement with a hospitality business that owns the building. Worse, it did not address what might come of building it has been so closely identified with the last 15 years.
Now, you could argue that what happens going forward is really none of The Star’s concern, but still, you’d think the paper would recognize that was a huge issue and at least nominally address it.
But, no, The Star kept its report — another grim admission of the paper’s downward spiral — as short as possible, while not featuring it on its kansascity.com website and not even bothering to run the story in today’s print edition. (On the other hand, it did see fit to report that the men’s store Pinstripes was closing on the Plaza after many decades, first as Mister Guy, then as Pinstripes.)
But back to Dan’s story, which you can see free of charge and go back to as many times as you want.
Dan Margolies
Dan went straight to the top source, Rosie Privitera Biondo, a principal of Ambassador Hospitality, which bought the print pavilion from The Star three years ago for slightly more than $30 million — about $170 million less than the cost to build it.
To give you some perspective on the Privitera family, Rosie’s parents, Carl “Red” Privitera and wife Josephine, founded Mark One Electric in 1974 and grew the business into a powerhouse.
Several years ago, the family expanded into Ambassador Hospitality, and the print pavilion was its first and only, to my knowledge, major investment.
After relinquishing the building, The Star leased it back from Ambassador for a term of 15 years, with initial payments set at $2.8 million a year.
Rosie would not tell Dan if The Star would pay a penalty for ending the lease early, but I have to think it will pay a significant penalty. She went on to say Ambassador would discontinue any and all print operations at the building and would sell off the presses. From there, she said, the company was considering several possible new uses, including as a logistics center, a call fulfillment center or even a brewery.
Then she dropped the bombshell: If plans for a downtown baseball stadium should move forward, Ambassador might be willing to sell the building to make way for the stadium. “It could be the possible new Royals stadium — tear down the building, buy our property, build across the highway,” Rosie said.
Can’t you just envision it? What better place for the stadium, a block east of Grand Boulevard, with T-Mobile Center on the north side of I-670, the stadium on the south.
…I love the green glass building — it’s one of the best downtown has to offer — but I would surely vote to substitute it for a downtown baseball stadium. Such a development would complete the transition of downtown from wasteland (pre-Sprint/T-Mobile Center) to energetic, thriving city hub.
Indicative of the Privitera family’s vision back in 2017, Rosie said Ambassador had been eager to buy the building because “we saw the synergies of future possibilities.”
That prompted Dan to write…
The prospect of a baseball stadium downtown has long tantalized downtown boosters, and with the Royals’ change of ownership last year, the idea seems to have picked up momentum. Kansas City is one of the few major league cities without a downtown baseball stadium. Businessman John Sherman, who leads the new Royals ownership group, could not immediately be reached for comment Wednesday.
The Royals certainly lost money this year, with no fans attending shortened-season games, and I would doubt that Sherman and his co-owners would be ready to take on such an expensive proposition anytime soon.
But the good news that emanates from The Star’s bad news is that we might be a step closer to a downtown stadium. Even if The Star’s offices end up in rented office space (for some reason I’m envisioning the second floor of a building in “downtown” Brookside), its decision to build a shimmering print pavilion in the mid 2000s might turn out, ironically, to have been the cornerstone for the capstone of our new, mighty downtown.
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
After reading this and your last story on The Star I thought it was interesting that I was told recently that the Shawnee Mission Post had become more of a reference point for JOCO news than The Star.
Yet another down side of the digital age is that a few energetic individuals with a website can become specialists in an area neglected by the major newspaper, and suddenly the newspaper becomes hacked to pieces. That is why I encouraged some of the long-timers with The Star’s institutional memory to create their own digital news service to compete with The Star.
The second thing that comes to mind is the history of The Kansan, WYCO’s former newspaper, after they sold their building. It didn’t take long for it to go into ever smaller offices and then shrink to nothing.
A newspaper’s brick-and-mortar presence is certainly important. It was a thrill for me to walk into that dark-brick, three-story building at 18th and Grand. It made me proud to work for The Star.
I remember once going to Publisher Jim Hale and telling him the big windows looked terrible from the outside and badly needed painting. Although it was unbudgeted, he immediately ordered up a paint job. After that, Scott Whiteside, then our in-house attorney, began calling me “the most powerful reporter at The Star.” I got a kick out of that, but the story demonstrates your point.
And that’s what’s so depressing about envisioning The Star in a second-floor, Brookside office building. Guess they’d just hang a sign on an upper window…
A sad state of affairs for the Star. Its story was thinner than a stick figure. My guess is they set will up shop with a PO Box and let staffers work from home. Maybe Pete Grathoff will collect reactions from Twitter about the prospect of a downtown ballpark.
I’m sorry to see you hiding behind Nelson’s fat ass, but, then again, anyone who goes after Pete Grathoff knows what he (she) is talking about. He’s gone, in my book, from worst reporter at The Star to the World’s Laziest Reporter. The fact that they play his tripe prominently on the website is yet another example of how The Star has drifted from a serious broadsheet to something akin to a sports- and entertainment-centered tabloid.
I smell formaldehyde.
Oh, oh.
No downtown stadium. I’m sick of this discussion. Kauffman is beautiful and there’s no need for a change. I don’t know what to do with the KC Star building but I would hate to see it go.
Fitz, I thought you stopped smoking weed!!
What, regarding the print pavilion making way for a downtown stadium?? Seems completely plausible to me, as I sit here absolutely clear headed.
Jim, I’ll take a good newspaper over a good baseball team, regardless of where they’re playing, any day of the week. And for that matter, I’ll take a bad newspaper over a good baseball team, regardless of where they’re playing, any day of the week.
What a great gift to the city —
Privitera Stadium!
Maybe the Priviteras should donate the land, instead of trying to get something like $60 million out of their $30 million investment.
A stadium that spans the highway in that location would violate a host of security and terrorist rules and regulations developed by the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency in the wake of 911. A stadium downtown may happen someday, but it won’t happen there.
The Star has become that relative we adored in our youth, but who has been stricken by a neurodegenerative disorder. First the family had to move them from their large home filled with memories into a sterile, glass encased nursing home. Now we’re looking at hospice.
On the first point, Joe, I have no doubt you’re right about the highway, but I believe the Priviteras’ vision is the stadium is built either north or south of the loop and then further bridging I-670 for foot and vehicular traffic. In either case, the print-plant footprint is part of the flow.
On your Star analogy…ouch!
Jim, I remain skeptical of that location regardless the configuration. There are a number of other downtown sites that would be far cheaper to acquire and develop. Given the current and looming economic city, county and state economic realities talk of a downtown baseball stadium is a fun distraction, but a distraction nonetheless. In the meantime, the ‘K” works just fine.
As far as the Star analogy… yes, it hurts. Watching the decline of what was such a dynamic and vital institution has been heartbreaking and painful on a personal and professional basis. It’s not quite time to publish the Star’s obit, but we sure need to have one in the can, ready to go when the funeral home calls.
Joe — A friend and blog commenter, Jack Holland, chided me in a phone call yesterday for gushing about the possibility of a downtown stadium without addressing how it might be paid for. He’s right: I let titillation supersede practicality. In this environment and these very trying times, I can’t see any local government — just about anywhere — committing hundreds of millions for a stadium or arena. And, obviously, the Sherman group isn’t going to undertake it. So, I’ve calmed my jets and, like you, am putting a downtown stadium back on the shelf to gather dust.
I can’t see the advantage of a downtown baseball park. Kauffman has ample parking, ease of access for most people. The downtown loop entrance and exit ramps are harrowing and inadequate for more traffic. Surrounding streets are insufficient to accommodate thousands of cars. It would be a congestion nightmare. The argument that we’re the only major league city without a downtown ballpark doesn’t make sense. Perhaps other cities don’t have the land to provide a large complex like Royals and Chiefs possess. Kansas City has many pressing needs for spent money. A new stadium isn’t one of them.
Yankee Stadium is not Downtown, as are not Citi Field, Dodger Stadium, Wrigley Field, Fenway Park and Texas Rangers Stadium.
Yankee Stadium, Fenway and Wrigley, while not downtown, are in dense urban neighborhoods, and they contribute to economic development unlike the current Royals ballpark.
That’s an excellent point, Tom…The only two businesses I can think of within walking distance of the Sports Complex are a gas station and the Adam’s Mark hotel. If we had a stadium downtown, think of the number of people who would pour money into downtown businesses, with 81 home games a year. That said, like my friend Jack Holland said, the cost of a downtown stadium could be out of reach. The Royals’ and Chiefs’ leases are up, I believe, in 2031. The issue of a downtown stadium could be taken up several years before that, with a view toward renewing at the Sports Complex or heading downtown, at least with the Royals.
Not to belabor the discussion, but there is plenty of downtown parking that garage owners would love to fill up on nights and weekends with baseball fans. Downtown residents could walk to games and a huge parking at Union Station served by the streetcar. Of course all dependent on study and stadium location.
Please, someone, address return on taxpayer investment!
Correction to a previous post I made (but can’t find) – the NYTs area edition says “printed in Columbia, MO” not the WSJ. So I guess that means the WSJ will be looking for a printer if they used the Star’s presses, as I think you implied. I’d be interested in hearing where those presses go, and how it impacts the other publications.
Good to know, Bill…A couple of friends and I were talking about the printing situation — and what would come of it — yesterday. We thought Columbia was the closest major operation but we weren’t sure. Columbia will probably get most of the other business that was being handled at The Star’s plant.