As D.C. lawmakers look to spend more time assessing the Bowser administration's deal to build a new NFL stadium and mixed-use district at the RFK Stadium site, the mayor and the football franchise are pushing for a vote as soon as possible.
“I have a kind of a motto that I live by, and it's this: Sometimes a window of opportunity opens, and we don't know how soon it's going to close.” Mayor Muriel Bowser said Thursday at Bisnow’s The Future of RFK Stadium and Hill East event.
“We don't want to close the window on RFK.”
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Bisnow/Jon Banister
D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser speaks at Bisnow's The Future of RFK Stadium and Hill East event Thursday.
The Bowser administration and the Washington Commanders struck a deal in April to bring the team back to the city after three decades in suburban Maryland. It plans to move into a newly built stadium surrounded by mixed-use development with thousands of homes.
The D.C. Council still needs to approve the deal, which includes the city putting up more than $1B in taxpayer funds for public infrastructure at the site.
The agreement gave the D.C. Council a deadline of July 15 to approve the deal in order to hit the Commanders' target of opening the stadium in time for the 2030 NFL season.
With a few weeks left until that date, the council indicated this week it plans to take more time on that decision.
The funding for the stadium deal was included in Bowser’s fiscal year 2026 budget proposal when she released it last month. On Tuesday, Council Chairman Phil Mendelson introduced standalone legislation on the stadium deal to separate it from the budget, a step he said would allow the council to “complete its due diligence” and hold a public hearing on the stadium.
In response to the move, Bowser told reporters immediately following Bisnow's event that she is “very concerned about it because it's not in line with our agreement with the team.”
Commanders officials are also anxious for construction to get underway.
“We don’t have time on our side,” Commanders Head of Real Estate Andy VanHorn said at Bisnow's event, held at the Washington Marriott Georgetown.
VanHorn, who was previously with JBG Smith and Dweck Properties, was hired by the Commanders to spearhead the RFK project earlier this year.
He said the team is working closely with the council to get “everything they need” as they complete their due diligence while at the same time “reminding everyone about [their] desire to be here and the importance of delivering in 2030.”
Of the city’s 12 council members, four have signaled they support the bill but would like some changes, another four are leaning no but might support it under certain conditions, three are undecided, and one is a no, The Washington Post reported. The bill needs seven votes to pass.
“I passed the ball — OK, you're going to get all my sports metaphors — to the D.C. Council a couple of months ago,” Bowser said onstage. “They're doing their work, and we want them to do their work and to stay on track with our exclusive agreement with the Washington Commanders. The time is now. The opportunity is great. The risk is even greater.”
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Bisnow/Jon Banister
Cushman & Wakefield's Bill Collins and Washington Commanders Head of Real Estate Andy VanHorn
VanHorn said the team hopes to get council approval “later this summer” and that work on utilities would need to start by the first half of next year for the timeline to work out.
The Commanders have a lease at Northwest Stadium, formerly FedEx Field, in Prince George’s County until 2027, which would need to be extended based on the 2030 timeline.
In addition to moving the team into a new home in a timely manner, the Commanders have a big financial incentive to deliver in the next five years.
Team officials expect the stadium would hold about 200 events a year, in addition to eight or nine NFL home games. And they want the new stadium to be in the running to host the Women’s World Cup and the Rugby World Cup, both set to be hosted by the U.S. in 2031.
“2031 is a major year in the sports world,” VanHorn said.
He said the team is already in discussions to host those events and said the stadium would need to be operational for a full year before World Cup events to be considered.
“And so we’re absolutely focused on that year being an incredibly pivotal year,” he said.
The team plans to get the stadium completed first and then turn to the mixed-use portion of the site, which is expected to bring in some 6M SF of development, including 5,000 to 6,000 housing units, hotels, retail, restaurants, a new recreation center and a large amount of public green space.
Under their agreement, the Commanders would serve as the master developer for the mixed-use district and would invest $2.7B for the stadium. The team would also be on the hook for any cost overruns, with the city's investment remaining fixed.
To minimize the risk of cost overruns, an issue many commercial developers are facing, VanHorn said the project needs to get started as soon as possible.
“The way we solve that is early everything, right? Like early site work, early hiring team, early design, early contractor engagement, early negotiations on the [project labor agreement],” VanHorn said.
“So we think about everything as getting it done today, the window of opportunity,” he added, echoing Bowser's earlier comments. “We have a window of opportunity to move forward immediately, and we need to do that now.”