A recent Policy Brief detailed spending by the City of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County for the 2026 NFL Draft. The combined $4 million (plus “the value of various in-kind City services”) will join with corporate dollars and money from VisitPittsburgh to bring the “host community” total to $11 million.
Thanks to the state budget deal made official on Nov. 12, $50 million from gaming will be transferred to the Tourism Promotion Fund to spend on America’s 250th celebration as well as “[n]o less than $10,000,000 to a designated tourism promotion agency located in a county of the second class that has been designated to manage and organize a professional sports league draft event.”
Translation? VisitPittsburgh will receive at least $10 million to handle the NFL Draft, held in the City of Pittsburgh, which is situated in Allegheny County.
Now the questions are:
Does the state money reimburse the City of Pittsburgh for the costs incurred on public safety and sanitation? Will that be spent in addition to the $11 million plus the capital project spending?
When the city council approved its $1 million expenditure in October of last year, the director of the Office of Management and Budget stated “[w]e don’t have a firm sense of the level or form of the state’s financial commitment yet, but they are deeply involved in the conversation at this point.”
The state allocation comes on top of capital spending for Market Square and Point State Park, projects done in advance of the Draft.
Hopefully, the net fiscal impact on the city, county, metro area and state is made clear in post-event analysis. Of course, it is hard to imagine what ramifications there would be from the taxing bodies should the Draft deliver a less-than-resounding payoff.
