![The Philadelphia Phillies are expected to break ground on the expansion of the team’s Clearwater, Florida spring training facility in April, 2020. - Darrin [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons](https://media2.cltampa.com/cltampa/imager/u/original/11995441/2012_phillies_spring_training_7395135988_.5c472b5deaf9a.png)
The $80 million expansion at the Philadelphia Phillies’ Spectrum Field and Carpenter Complex is getting a $6 million dollar boost from the city of Clearwater.
Clearwater initially allocated $10 million for its contribution to the project, but a proposed lease arrangement to keep the team’s spring training home in the city for another 20 years drove a decision to add additional funds to the investment. That’s according to the TBBJ which reported that the additional funding was approved without opposition.
That’s bad news for the Sand Key Bridge replacement project, however, which will take a $6 million hit as a result. According to the newspaper, the motion to take funds from the bridge project for the training facility was also approved without opposition.
According to a timeline, the city will dole out the $16 million by providing $2.5 million in 2020, $5 million in 2021, $1 million in 2022, $1.5 million 2023 and $6 million in 2024. Funding for the project is expected to come from multiple sources, according to TBBJ, including the of Penny for Pinellas funds— a one-percent sales tax that's used to fund infrastructure and public facilities.
The county is expected to review the funding agreement on January 22.
