State of the City
2025 State of the City
AS PREPARED FOR DELIVERY
Thank you, Teresa. And thank you to your Chamber board, and thank you to Christy Gillenwater and the Chamber staff, both for your continued partnership and your hosting of this event today. And thank you to everyone gathered here today, or watching online, or watching or reading later. By taking this time, you’re investing in the civic life of our city, and that investment is critical for our continued success.
Let me begin at the only place we possibly could. A year ago, I stood on this stage, and I said repeatedly that all we do is win in OKC. I didn’t mean that in quite the same literal sense that I do today, but as we all know, last month, all our Thunder did was win, and as a result, we are the champions.
Let’s show our appreciation once again to Clay Bennett and his partners, Sam Presti and all Thunder staff, Coach Mark Daigneault and the coaching staff, and of course, the 18 players who delivered one of the most successful seasons in NBA history and our city’s first NBA championship.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this amazing and historic moment these past three weeks. This afternoon, I will attempt to put into words what I think we are all feeling.
I am something of a student of our city’s history, and I believe this moment is among the most important positive developments in our 136-year journey. In 1928, nothing was ever the same after they discovered oil and gas here. In 1941, nothing was ever the same after the establishment of what would become Tinker Air Force Base. Nothing was ever the same after Clara Luper’s sit-inners sat at that lunch counter. Nothing was ever the same after we passed MAPS in 1993, or after we became the home of the Thunder in 2008. And nothing will ever be the same after June, 2025. Our city has achieved sports immortality, but we have also once again forever changed the way we see ourselves and the way the world sees us. This achievement elevates our entire city to a new plateau of credibility, and it will open doors of opportunity that extend far beyond sports. We’ll be walking through those doors for many years to come.
When we think about what it took to get to that moment, I remind you that securing Oklahoma City’s first major league professional sports championship was more than just a reflection of excellence on the basketball court. It was the ultimate validation of three decades of vision, investment and hard work by everyone in this community.
The first public use of the phrase “big league city” in relation to Oklahoma City’s aspirations was in January of 1992, as Mayor Ron Norick and city leaders developed what would ultimately become the MAPS proposal, which the voters approved in December of 1993.
Here’s the front-page headline from The Saturday Oklahoman & Times on January 18th, 1992. As you see, the headline reads “Task Force Sets Goal of Making City ‘Big League.’” The day before this headline, Mayor Norick had stood in the Council chambers at City Hall and had declared publicly for the first time that Oklahoma City would aspire to be a big league city. No goal for this community has been more enduring or powerful since that day.
Now fast forward 33 years to this headline from last week in The Economist, the most influential international newsweekly in the world. It is a paper of record, as they say, and the record they keep is global. And this headline could not be more definitive. It reads “Big-league city: Oklahoma City has been reborn.”
This sporting achievement of winning an NBA championship is a prism through which we and the rest of the world can finally and truly appreciate that which we have created here in OKC. And perhaps nothing illustrates the bookends of this chapter more simply than those two headlines from 1992 and 2025. We did it, OKC. We did it.
If Jaylin Williams were standing here, he might say that we bleepin’ did it. Happy Jaylin Williams Day, by the way, to all those who celebrate.
Now, our city’s renaissance story has not come to an end, by any means. And the next half hour or so will make that clear. But it has clearly reached a milestone, the conclusion of one chapter and the commencement of another. I believe this milestone will be remembered as our moment of arrival. Sam Presti, the architect of our city’s basketball success, said a few years ago when the team was rebuilding that, quote, “When we do get back to the postseason, we want it to be an arrival and not an appearance.”
In the 33 years since we declared our intention to be a big league city, mayors of OKC might have said in this setting that the state of our city is hopeful, optimistic, aspirational, driven. These are words of anticipation. I’ve used them myself. For three decades, we were perpetually on the rise, the next big thing, the city on the verge. Ours was a narrative in search of a climax. We were making appearances in the quest to be a great American city, and with each appearance, we were always one step closer, but we still left you wondering - would this boomtown ever make it?
If you apply Sam Presti’s statement to our city’s emergence on the global stage, the year 2008 was a historic one in our city’s history. I mentioned it a moment ago, it’s top five. But finally getting an NBA team in 2008 now feels like an appearance. June, 2025 was our city’s arrival.
The half million people who came out on June 24th inherently understood that. Our Champions Parade wasn’t just a celebration of having scored more points than the other team. It was a recognition that this is our time.
For half a million people there and many more watching at home, June 24th was a collective emotional release for a city that had labored for three decades to realize that moment. June 24th, 2025 was the single greatest day in Oklahoma City history because the same city once burdened by economic depression, tornados, downtown desolation and terrorism could now stand together with all of our neighbors – literally - and make the objective and truthful statement, with the acknowledgement of the entire world, that we are the champions, and you can never take that away from us. Each of us understood on June 24th that we had arrived, and that nothing will ever be the same again in Oklahoma City.
When the Thunder first began their story 17 seasons ago, their marketing slogan was “Rise Together,” acknowledging that the team and the city were both still climbing. We are a city particularly bereft of actual elevation, but today, in 2025, with a trophy in hand, we metaphorically stand together at the peak of the mountain. Our rise is complete. This is our time. And so the state of our city in 2025 is assured. We are confident, but it is no longer the confidence that we can achieve something, it is the confidence that we have.
And so, now we stand upon the peak of that mountain that we were climbing for 33 years. And you know what you see when you stand upon the peak of a mountain? New mountains to climb.
In its modern history, Oklahoma City has always asked itself – what’s next? And so today, even as the sun hits our face a little different than it did before, we shall ask that question once again.
First of all, the foundation of our success these last three decades has been our willingness to invest in ourselves. That’s the singular piece of advice I give any other mayor. I always tell them, find a way to invest in your city like we have in OKC, because OKC’s investments have paid off many times over.
Since the passage of MAPS in 1993, we’ve never failed a vote, and since then we’ve passed four MAPS sales tax initiatives and several single-issue sales tax initiatives focused on streets, public safety and our downtown arena. We have also, like clockwork, successfully passed bond issue initiatives, funded through property tax, to maintain and take care of our core infrastructure. There is no permanent funding stream for infrastructure in the management of Oklahoma cities. We have to use bond issues and we have to ask your permission each time.
In the last 30 years, Oklahoma City voters have overwhelmingly approved bond issues for infrastructure in 1995, 2000, 2007 and 2017. And yesterday, your City Council voted to send to the people of Oklahoma City on Tuesday, October 14th our first such bond issue package since 2017. This new bond issue puts $2.7 billion towards core infrastructure across the city. And it does so without increasing property taxes, as it will simply extend the taxation that has expired from previous bond issues. Most of what you pay in property tax each year does not go to the city government. We are just a small slice of your overall property tax bill. And the average millage rate you’re paying today in those property taxes to the city will stay the same over the next decade as this bond issue plays out. And if it stays the same, you’ll get to keep driving on streets and drinking water. This is not an initiative for dreamers. It’s about maintaining what we have. It’s about the basics. It’s about needs, not wants.
And due to this city’s unique geographic size, we have a lot of needs. If you’ve been to one of my State of the City addresses in the past, you know I love to shock you with illustrations of how uniquely large our city is. To remind you of one such example, within our city of 620 square miles, at the same time, you could fit Boston, Anaheim, Minneapolis, Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Miami, Berkeley, Providence, Newark, St. Paul, Oakland, Buffalo, Tempe, Fort Lauderdale, South Bend and Alexandria, Virginia. And so our 712,000 residents collectively carry the infrastructure burden of all the residents of all those combined cities. That’s among the many reasons this bond issue on October 14th is a necessity.
So what is specifically in the package you will consider on October 14th? Well, 56 percent of all of the dollars are allocated for maintaining and upgrading our city streets – 433 projects addressing streets, bridges and traffic. This is by far the largest commitment to city streets in Oklahoma City history. You may recall that the 2017 bond issue was also focused on streets, and it has made a significant difference.
This chart illustrates that improvement. We have almost 9,000 lane miles to maintain in OKC, which, again, due to our size, is an exceptionally high number for any city. The Pavement Condition Index is the industry standard, and it grades street conditions on a scale of 0 to 100. In 2010, our city’s average PCI for those 9,000 lane miles was 60. Today, after all of the investment in streets from the 2007 and 2017 bond issues, it is now 70. And 70 is considered satisfactory in the rating system. But that’s a citywide average. We obviously have many streets below 70, and we want to address them. Plus, even as we sit here, thousands of heavy metal objects are rolling without a care right over our pristine asphalt, so it’s a job that never ends. But this $1.5 billion investment just in our city streets will continue our historic progress.
The remaining dollars in the bond issue cover city maintenance and data facilities, economic development, housing, parks and recreational facilities, libraries and learning centers, drainage, transit, police and fire. As I said earlier, this is not sexy stuff. These are the city’s fundamental needs. But if we want to maintain our ability to dream big, to have the luxury of pursuing more ambitious improvements in quality of life, we have to take care of the basics first. We’ve routinely done that in the modern history of our city, and this is the next chapter of that story. And that’s why we’ll be asking you to vote yes on October 14th. Please mark your calendar right now. We can never take our city’s basic needs for granted.
And while we’re in this area, let’s hit on some other basics of your city government. It all starts with our Council. From Wards 1 through 8, your councilmembers are Bradley Carter, James Cooper, Katrina Avers, Todd Stone, Matt Hinkle, JoBeth Hamon, Camal Pennington and Mark Stonecipher. Those Councilmembers who are here, please stand so we can thank you for your service.
They are supported by nearly 500 community volunteers I appoint to nearly 60 active boards. And of course, the day-to-day implementation of the vision set by these elected or appointed residents is carried out by City Manager Craig Freeman and the 5,000 employees of the city. In two years, we will reach the 100th anniversary of our current form of government, meaning that we have had a City Manager for 98 years. We’ve had some great ones, and Craig is taking his place among them. And actually, I doubt he knows this, but he’s now the third-longest serving city manager in our history. Once again, last month, OKC was named one of the best-run cities in America. And the City of OKC team achieves this excellence with fewer employees than almost every other large city. Among the top 25 largest cities, we rank 20th for employees per capita. And for 17 years in a row, our bond ratings have continued to be at the absolute highest level, another measurement of our great city management. Would the City Manager and all city employees please stand to be recognized?
The excellence of our city staff was certainly on display on June 24th, when the largest group of people in city history descended on downtown Oklahoma City. Working alongside the Thunder, this Chamber, Visit OKC, Downtown OKC Partnership, the National Memorial and Museum, EMSA and partner law enforcement agencies, our City team ensured that the day was as smooth and safe as possible. I want to thank our Police department, led by Chief Bacy, Captain Audrea George and her special events team, the Fire department, led by Chief Kelly, EMBARK, led by Jesse Rush, Public Works, led by Debbie Miller, Utilities, led by Chris Browning and Public Information, led by Kristy Yager, for their excellent planning that delivered a day that half a million people will remember for the rest of their lives. Let’s show our gratitude to everyone who planned and executed our Champions Parade on June 24th.
In this past year, our city staff have not just responded to celebration, but also to crisis. In the early morning hours of November 3rd, we had our city’s worst tornado damage in nearly a decade, and many of those same city departments I just listed delivered a different kind of service, and with just the same level of care and skill. Fortunately, no one was killed, but many homes were destroyed at two locations in Southeast OKC. Our city staff consistently provides the best emergency response in the nation.
Though our city staff serves the people of OKC every day, they still also have a long tradition of running an impressive annual workforce campaign to raise money for nonprofit causes. The Heart of the City campaign this year raised $589,347 from the personal donations of City of OKC employees. Their dollars went to support more than 100 local charities.
Heart of the City is administered by the United Way of Central Oklahoma, an organization with a century of history that now supports 68 partner agencies. Our city employees and the United Way fully understand that nonprofits meet countless critical needs in our city. These nonprofit agencies change lives and in many cases save lives. By the way, we have the President and CEO of United Way here today. She happens to be at my table, and she’d love to sign up your business for a workplace campaign. Thank you, Rachel Holt for all you do for our city and for me and our family. I want to also thank Maggie and George, and we’re also joined today by my dad Stroud, my cousins Kelsey and Sydney, and the people who keep me afloat professionally, Bailey, Karen and Cindy. Will you join me in thanking all of these folks in my life?
Now, back to our team at the City of OKC. Though they have already set a standard of excellence, they are also always looking to improve. We’ve talked in the past here about our Innovation office and our work to improve the delivery of public safety. A great example of both was the launch this past year of the new alternative response program to respond to behavioral and mental health 9-1-1 calls.
And by the way, crime rates in OKC have continued their multiyear decline. You can see here in this chart that over the last decade crimes against both persons and property have declined by more than a third.
And thanks to a concerted community effort, the challenge of homelessness is also moving in the right direction. A smaller percentage of our city’s residents are experiencing homelessness today than they were two decades ago.
There are few issues measured more closely than homelessness, so we have a lot of data going back for two decades. I’m going to share today some pretty basic indicators on homelessness in OKC that I think you’ll find helpful.
This chart illustrates the point I made a moment ago. Take a second to look it over. Almost exactly 20 years ago is when this community got more organized and intentional about the issue of homelessness. This chart illustrates that in 2007, the average annual population of people in our city experiencing homelessness in the three years from 2005 to 2007 was 1,656. What we didn’t necessarily know in 2007 was that our overall city population was about to soar. As you see in the chart, just in the city limits, we have gained over 165,000 people since 2007. Just that increase would be the third-largest city in the state of Oklahoma.
But as we sit here today, the most recent three-year average of people experiencing homelessness in the city is not much larger than it was in 2007. Which means, as you see on the chart, that a significantly smaller percentage of our residents are experiencing homelessness today than they were in 2007. If you break it down to every 10,000 residents of the city, 30 were homeless in 2007 and 24 are homeless today.
Unsheltered homelessness is obviously the most visible homelessness. It’s a smaller subset of overall homelessness. And as you see on the chart, there is essentially no difference in the three-year average between 2007 and today.
Now, around 2020, we did have an increase in the number of unsheltered homeless, but as you see on this chart, that number has come down for four straight years.
As a result of all this, we don’t rank especially high on homelessness among large cities our size. We’re sort of middle of the pack. There are smaller cities with more homeless people and larger cities with less. But no one with a national perspective would ever consider our challenges to be anywhere close to what is being faced in dozens of other peer cities. We are the 20th-largest city in America, but we don’t have the 20th-most people experiencing homelessness.
Now, having said all of that - a few takeaways. First, citywide progress is relevant, but we also recognize it doesn’t mean much if you or someone you care about is experiencing homelessness, or if you’re living in, working in or visiting an area of the city that is acutely affected. One person experiencing homelessness is too many and that’s always the attitude we’ll take.
Second, our population growth is not slowing down, so this issue isn’t going away. Homelessness numbers fairly predictably correlate to overall population, and so as our city continues to grow, we will have to work harder to maintain these numbers or even reduce them. And our population growth will also put pressure on housing prices, which will contribute to the challenge.
Third takeaway - That general stability you see between 2007 and 2025, in the face of significant population growth, is a reflection of strategy and collaboration and resources. It was no accident. For much of that time, those efforts were driven by the nonprofit sector, specifically the homelessness service provider community. But as I said, this is only getting harder and more challenging as we grow. So, it is really no longer possible for the nonprofit community to bear this burden alone.
To focus our larger community on the challenge to an even greater degree, I appointed a task force in 2019 to develop a unified strategy that carried the credibility of City Hall. That has led to city staffing, city investments, city leadership and city convening.
On a macro level, we are making efforts to address the issue of affordable housing availability that drives much of the numbers. MAPS 4, the 2017 bond issue and the proposed 2025 bond issue all include funding to create or incentivize affordable housing. The 2025 bond issue would take that total commitment over $100 million. And we’re looking at policy solutions to housing as well. This work is largely captured in the Housing Affordability Implementation Plan that the Council adopted this year. City of OKC Planning Director Geoff Butler and his team are leading the way on this topic.
And at the micro level, we are meeting people where they are. We have to. I get suggestions all the time to utilize strategies that lack an understanding of the limitations created by the United States Constitution. If a resident is not breaking a significant law, we do not have leverage over them to permanently seize their liberty, permanently relocate them, or force certain behaviors. And that’s not a choice we’ve made in Oklahoma City in 2025, that’s a choice this nation made in 1789 when the Bill of Rights was written.
But the lack of supposedly easy solutions doesn’t mean this issue is hopeless. Not at all. We have proven solutions from other cities to address the issue at the ground level. They’re just a little more expensive and time-consuming. But they work. Houston has a smaller percentage of its residents experiencing homelessness than we do, and their methods have become a national model for large cities like ours. Our Key to Home initiative is our OKC version of the Houston model.
Key to Home is overseen by a volunteer board, chaired by Clay Moss, implemented by city staffer Jamie Caves, and is supported by the city and a network of nonprofit agencies and private sector donors.
Key to Home goes into encampments and houses people, while offering them the bundle of services people experiencing homelessness need to stay in housing. This is an intensive and expensive effort, but it works better than anything else. And Key to Home has now housed hundreds of people. Key to Home and other efforts are working. The chart I showed you with four straight years of reductions in unsheltered homeless proves that point. We just have to stay focused, we can’t waste time on illegal or ineffective approaches, and we have to continue to commit resources. These numbers show progress and they provide hope, and our work on this challenge will continue.
I spoke just now of the impact that is made by investing in ourselves. Whether it is investing in a challenge or an opportunity, the through line in everything I say today will be our city’s consistent willingness to invest in itself. And of course, for thirty years, the model for that philosophy has been MAPS. And one of the many reasons I know that our renaissance isn’t slowing down is that we still have nearly a billion dollars worth of MAPS 4 projects yet to open.
Two MAPS 4 projects have opened since we last gathered. The most notable is the new OG&E Coliseum at the OKC Fairgrounds, which ensures that we remain the horse show capital of the world, and the home of long-running events like the state high school basketball tournaments and the Youth Expo. The OG&E Coliseum is spectacular and preserves the tremendous economic impact we have enjoyed from the Fairgrounds.
A brief digression, if I may. It’s worth noting that this Coliseum project at the Fairgrounds reflects a period of remarkable investment and transition in our largest and most impactful public venues. As I talked about here in some detail a couple of years ago, the people of OKC had previously built four arenas over the last century – three downtown arenas and the Jim Norick Arena at the Fairgrounds. Today, we have just opened last month the OG&E Coliseum and we have approved our new downtown arena. So these are our fifth and sixth such venues to be built by the people of Oklahoma City. And as a result of these new venues, we are demolishing two arenas, the first time we’ve ever done that. And so this summer we are bidding a fond farewell to the Myriad and the Jim Norick Arena. The Thunder recently made a film about the Myriad and there’s a lot of great articles out there about the Norick Arena and its history.
The second MAPS 4 project that opened this past year is also intended to bring economic impact, and that is the innovation Hall in our Innovation District. The Innovation District is already hosting new endeavors in bio and tech, and is living up to the vision we had for this area. Diversification of our economy has been a strategic goal of this city since the 1980s, and we continue to see momentum in that effort, which MAPS 4 will support through these investments in the Innovation District.
This past year has been a major one for MAPS 4 groundbreakings. We broke ground on the Diversion Hub, the new animal shelter, the Palomar family justice center, bus shelters, sidewalks, and projects along the Oklahoma River. We are also making progress on our MAPS 4 projects dedicated to housing, parks, youth soccer, youth centers, beautification, mental health, small business support, the Clara Luper Civil Rights Center, our fifth senior wellness center, transit and our new multipurpose stadium. And that stadium is now the catalyst for an entire development led by Christian Kanady, Mark Beffort and Russell Westbrook, centered around an emphasis on strengthening our city’s ties to the global sport of soccer. Under the umbrella of MAPS 4, we’ll be cutting ribbons on quality-of-life improvements for years to come. Thanks to Teresa Rose, who leads the many volunteers overseeing MAPS 4, and David Todd, who leads construction efforts for both MAPS 4 and our new downtown arena.
Since we last gathered, we achieved another overwhelming endorsement of a city initiative, this time to collect an appropriate level of hotel tax on visitors that we will use to market our city to attract even more visitors. And some proceeds of that tax will also help maintain this building and the Fairgrounds, both of which drive our visitor economy. That sector continues to grow in our city, and the opening this year of the $400 million OKANA Resort brought another major visitor attraction to the city. Speaking of OKANA, we continue to appreciate our partnership with the Chickasaw Nation and all our tribal partners statewide. Oklahoma City continues to rise as a national capital for Native and Indigenous people, and at OCU Law, where I serve as Dean, we hosted another record-breaking Sovereignty Symposium last month, drawing over 700 people to OKANA.
Visitors and locals alike will increasingly rely upon public transit, and our planning around regional transit continues. We are in continuous conversations with the Regional Transit Authority, led by Governor Brad Henry, and our neighbors in Edmond and Norman, working toward the right plan and the right timing. This is definitely a priority for this community and that proposal will come.
Our districts around the city continue to grow and thrive. OKANA and First Americans Museum now headline the Horizons District, the new OAK development is a destination unto itself, and we cut the ribbon on a much-needed new streetscape in the Britton District.
Our annual citizen survey once again found an overwhelming level of support for our city’s direction. Sixty-nine percent of residents said our city is moving in the right direction, and 13 percent said it is not. So just always remember, no matter how amazing things get here in OKC, there’s still 13 percent of people who don’t really like it here. And don’t you worry about me getting too full of myself, because those 13 percent are also some of our city’s most prolific writers. What they may lack in technical skill, they make up in volume.
You may recall that we were repeatedly named the best city for public art, and we continue to debut impactful new pieces, including a piece in the Asian District honoring our Vietnamese community, a piece at the airport celebrating our Sister Cities, a new piece soon to arrive in Bricktown, and a piece we unveiled at the Zoo just last week telling the story of Gayla Peevey, the ten-year-old OKC girl who sang “I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas.” Speaking of music history and public art, we are looking forward to Route 66’s centennial next year. We have a lot of miles of Route 66 in OKC and many of our favorite districts and landmarks sit right on the Mother Road. We’re currently pursuing a public art piece to specifically connect with OKC’s lyric in the famous song, “Get Your Kicks on Route 66.”
Our Oklahoma River still looks mighty pretty, and continues to build its reputation as one of the paddlesport capitals of the world. Of course, RIVERSPORT, alongside the River, is hosting the Olympics in 2028, but it’s also hosting the International Canoe Federation World Championships and the ICF’s Congress in 2026. And a few miles to the Northeast, at Devon Park, which will also the host the Olympics in 2028, we broke the overall attendance record at this year’s Women’s College World Series.
Our economy is still strong, and is actually on a run that might qualify it as the most stable economy we’ve had in modern OKC history. As we sit here today, we are on the longest streak of unemployment below four percent since we started keeping that data point in 1990. We have not ticked above four percent in 46 months. The previous record was 38 months. And two months ago, we had the lowest unemployment rate in the entire country. And there are commercial developments breaking ground seemingly all over town, and most notably in some of our parcels downtown that have been vacant since Urban Renewal. In terms of economic diversification, job growth and commercial real estate development, these last few years have really been a singular time in our modern history, and the macro work we have done to create this environment now seems self-perpetuating. I think we’re just at the beginning of the OKC economic boom.
We continue to welcome all to our city and to engage everyone in our city’s story. In 2018, I said that it was one of my highest priorities to incorporate the diversity of our city into our decision-making process, and I’ve never wavered from that. Part of that ethos is also working to ensure that important stories are told in our city that were in danger of being forgotten. In a few months, we’ll dedicate a glorious monument just a few blocks from here to Clara Luper and the courageous sit-inners who changed our city forever. And thanks to everyone who has contributed to that project, including and especially co-chairs Pastor Lee Cooper and John Kennedy.
This year the Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum noted the thirtieth anniversary of the Bombing with impactful thoughtfulness. And President Clinton continued to keep the promise he made in 1995 to stand with us for as many tomorrows as it takes. Chair Dr. Susan Chambers and her board and President and CEO Kari Watkins and her staff delivered a very meaningful year, and certainly contributed greatly to the thirty years of light that have followed our day of darkness. And the Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon welcomed over 25,000 runners, setting a new record for participants.
At OKC Will Rogers International Airport, we invested in a customs area and secured the first nonstop international flight in modern times, an American Airlines flight to Cancun that will commence this fall. And in 2024, we set a new record with 4.6 million passengers.
I’ll account for more than my share of flights in the next year as I serve as President of the United States Conference of Mayors. And we’ll welcome a few of America’s mayors here in September when I host my Fall leadership meeting here in OKC.
We introduced a new team name this past year – the Comets. Our Triple A baseball team is our longest-running sports team in the city, with an unbroken history that goes back to 1962. We are excited to cheer for our Comets, who are of course the Triple A team of the defending world champion Los Angeles Dodgers.
Speaking of Los Angeles, there is of course hardly anything we anticipate more than the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics in OKC. On March 28th of this year, we received the final approvals necessary to have two sports and seven events of the Summer Olympics staged right here in Oklahoma City. On Monday of this week, we passed the three-year countdown to the Opening Ceremony on July 14, 2028. We remain incredibly grateful to our partners with the City of Los Angeles and LA28 for the trust they have given us, as well as the partnerships we enjoy with the International Canoe Federation and the World Baseball Softball Confederation.
The magnitude of this opportunity is still really beyond comprehension. No other city outside of Southern California is slated to host the entirety of any sport in 2028, much less two, as we are. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for our city, our state and this entire region of the country.
The schedule is still being set, but we know that in Paris in 2024, the events of canoe slalom lasted ten days, and a softball tournament lasts a week. So, we will have events here in OKC every single day of the Olympics, from July 14th to July 30th, 2028. There will be 200,000 tickets available, and the opportunity for many more to feel a part of this historic moment.
The Olympics transcends sports, and it is still surreal to state that they are coming to Oklahoma City. This will be yet another moment, after which nothing will feel the same, and so preparations are underway. I’m grateful to this Chamber for taking on the obligation of standing up our community efforts. You might have seen that Michael Byrnes has been named to lead our local efforts. Michael is organizing his team and our community vision, and there will be news to share in the year ahead. The run-up to the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics will capture our imaginations for the next three years, and it will dominate our daily existence in the summer of 2028.
I said earlier that from the mountaintop of our city’s first NBA Championship, that we can now see new mountains to climb. Certainly, the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics is such a peak.
Now, let my shift our gaze to another. And that is our long-term future with major league professional sports and the new arena that makes that future possible.
In December of 2023, 71 percent of voters approved the funding to construct a new, nearly $1 billion arena, which gave us the ability to secure a long-term commitment from the Thunder and the NBA. For the 18 months following the vote, that agreement was negotiated, and in the middle of this whirlwind, literally the morning after Game 5 of the NBA Finals, the City Council approved the agreement, and since then it has been signed by Clay Bennett and myself. And so, the Thunder are now committed in writing to play in our new arena for at least 25 years after it opens in 2028, officially extending our window as a big league city to at least 2053.
The primary purpose of this arena initiative was to secure a future with an NBA team that we could not secure in our current arena. Our current arena is too small by square footage, lacks the amenities of a modern and more expensive arena, and it is growing too old. This new arena will address all of those issues, and that is why we were able to attain a commitment that would otherwise elude a market our size. This investment in ourselves also ensures we can stay competitive in the battle for top concerts. But this project also has secondary benefit. This is our city’s fourth downtown arena, but it is our first true NBA arena, designed for basketball. It will be a much better experience for fans. It is also the first time we as a city have embarked upon a sports venue project with a budget befitting a big league city. With this budget, we have the ability to do something special that raises the aesthetic bar for the city and makes an architectural statement. And today, we’re here to make that statement.
As you know, we did not attempt to design anything before the vote. We didn’t have the funding to do that, none of us liked the idea of a fake placeholder design, and we wanted this design process to be deliberate and thoughtful. And so as a result, you have never previously seen any actual concept for this project. That changes today.
Architects around the world recognized the opportunity that this project presented, and so we attracted some of the highest-profile names in the arena design business. A rigorous and competitive process to choose the architect brought us David Manica, one of the most prominent visionaries in his field, with an impressive track record you should Google later. Last October, David was named Design Architect and was joined by TVS as the Architect of Record. A few months later, construction companies Flintco and Mortenson were brought in as the construction management team, allowing us to have someone at the table in the design process who fully understands practicality and cost, which gives us more confidence that our design can be constructed, and within the budget that we have.
Early on, David Manica and his team visited with members of the City Council and with community leaders. Then, this group I have described, along with other consultants, has been meeting regularly for the last eight months. Clay Bennett, Craig Freeman and myself, as well as others from the Thunder and the City, have been at every meeting where important decisions were made. Everyone in the room from Oklahoma City has fully understood the magnitude of the moment. This arena has every opportunity to visually define our city for many decades to come.
And so, to tell you more about his process and vision, I am thrilled to bring to the stage, the Design Architect for our new arena. Please welcome David Manica.
David, the floor is yours.
DAVID MANICA:
Thank you Mayor Holt for that generous introduction! And thank you for the invitation to bwith you on this historic day. And, good afternoon Oklahoma City! I’m both honored and humbled to be here this afternoon to present the vision of your new arena. But before we unveil the concept, I want to take a moment to explain how it came to be. Where it came from. And more importantly, what it means.
The city and the Thunder held interviews with multiple qualified architects late last summer, and like architects usually do, all of them showed up to the interview with their shiny and slick ideas of what your new arena could look like. Except for me. I showed up with no designs, no preconceptions, and no grand ideas that I hoped to convince the interviewers to instantly fall in love with. That is very unusual for an architect to do in these kinds of interviews, and it was frankly a pretty risky and terrifying approach! But, what I did come with was sincerity in my heart, an understanding of what this building will mean to this city, and a willingness to listen. Listen first. And then dream. That is the approach I believed would yield the most genuine and lasting result.
A day or two after the interviews, I took the call that I had been selected as the designer of what will be the next most important building in this growing city. I was thrilled! But not just because I had "won." It wasn't about winning. I was thrilled by the opportunity to do something really special here. I have dedicated my entire 30+ year career to the design of these kinds of sport and entertainment venues around the world. And the reason I love my job so much is because I am blessed to design buildings like this that people absolutely love going to. Try to think of another building that people love to go to more than their hometown arena to watch their home team win. These arenas mean so much to a community, and I am dedicated and driven by the understanding that this arena will be a uniquely meaningful project in the context of your city’s story. So, thank you, again, to the City, the Thunder, and especially Mayor Holt and Clay Bennett for trusting me, and my incredible team, as the steward of your vision for the new arena.
And so, a week or so after that call, we kicked off the design of this project with what we called a Visioning Session. For about two hours, me and my team simply asked the Mayor, the city, and the Thunder for their impressions of what this arena wanted to be. What MUST it be. What would it symbolize? What were its aspirations? How would it be measured for success by each of them, and the people of OKC?
We asked questions like: if this arena were to be a reflection of this community, what would that look like? What are the defining values and characteristics of this city and its people?
And after each question, we listened very carefully. Words like, "Unity", "Community", "Resiliency", "Authenticity", "Kindness", and "Generosity" kept coming up. Words like "Equality", "Diversity", "Integrity", "Hope" and "Steadfastness" kept coming up. And for the arena, aspirations of "Timelessness", "Beauty", "Wonder" and "Sophistication" kept coming up. One of the moments in that visioning session that struck me somewhere very deep inside, and a moment I will never forget, was Clay Bennett’s comment to me directly in that room full of people. He said, "David. We are not looking to design the next great arena of this generation. We are designing the first great arena of the NEXT generation. Wow. No pressure there!
But I immediately understood what he meant. This building had to be all of these things together. Simple and yet sophisticated. Completely unique, but also timeless. Beautiful, but also highly functional. And above all, spectacular enough to bring the eyes of the world to OKC. And for OKC, and all of its people, to be proud of what they have done here. Together. The idea that this arena would be “One of One” was born.
And so. As you watch this video, I hope you can see, and FEEL, what came out of that listening. What came out of those dreams that we shared together on those first days of the project. And what has evolved through the good work and collaboration of everybody involved in its design, every day, since we first started our listening to what this project wanted to be. I hope you will see that this design carries that sense of equality and balance in its shape. It offers transparency and authenticity from every angle. It is sophisticated and timeless in its spirit. I hope you can sense how this building will become a vessel for memories and the shared experiences for generations to come.
But more than anything else, I want you to notice that in this design, unlike any other arena in the world, the community will come together as one. The crowd is united as one around the court. And, all the concourses share the same, singular, volume of space, no matter where you are in the building. Everybody is in it together. And for me, that is what I have come to know, and understand, that Oklahoma City is all about. We are in this. Together.
MAYOR HOLT:
Thank you, David. With no further ado, Oklahoma City, please meet your new arena.
Talk about dreaming big. I know you’re going to want to watch that again and again, and you can at okcnewarena.com. In the meantime, David, you have given our city an amazing gift. This design is truly one of one and it will come to define Oklahoma City. Let’s show our gratitude to David Manica.
An NBA Championship. A long-term agreement with the Thunder. A $2.7 billion commitment to our core infrastructure. Street ratings that are going up and homelessness and crime rates that are going down. The promise of 16 new MAPS 4 projects. The strongest economy in our city’s history. The 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. And our beautiful new arena. Mountains we have conquered, mountains we will climb. This mission-focused city is America’s most dynamic, and this is our time. Thank you for the honor of serving as your mayor as we ascend these peaks together. Now get out of here and go watch that video again. Thank you!