Six Missouri lawmakers have asked the Cole County circuit court to block Gov. Jay Nixon and the St. Louis Regional Convention and Sports Authority (RSA) from spending Edward Jones Dome money on a proposed new football stadium.
State Rep. Jay Barnes, R-Jefferson City, is both a plaintiff and the lawyer who filed the 9-page lawsuit Wednesday.
He declined to comment, "because the attached petition speaks for itself."
The case was assigned to Presiding Circuit Judge Pat Joyce. No hearings have been set yet.
The plaintiffs include state Sen. Rob Schaaf, R-St. Joseph, and Reps. Tracy McCreery, D-St. Louis County, and Republicans Barnes, Rob Vescovo, Arnold, and Mark Parkinson, St. Charles.
They note they are "taxpayers whose tax money is in the process of being spent illegally ... in pursuance of an illegal construction of a new NFL stadium in St. Louis with taxpayer money." The lawmakers want the court to issue declaratory judgments and writs of prohibition blocking the use of any taxpayers' money on the new stadium.
Their lawsuit reminds the court the RSA was created by state law and given authority to construct and operate the Edward Jones Dome in downtown St. Louis. Financing for the project occurred with help from state taxpayers as well as St. Louis City and County taxpayers.
The National Football League's Rams have leased the domed stadium and played in it since 1995.
Rams owner Stan Kroenke "has announced his intention to build a new football stadium in southern California which would serve as a new venue for the Rams," the lawsuit explained, prompting Nixon late last year "to appoint a two-person task force to develop a financing plan for construction and operation of a new sports stadium to present to the Rams ownership and the NFL."
As of May 1, the suit said, the RSA has been billed almost $808,500 for legal fees, architectural designs and other fees - and has signed contracts with architects, engineers, surveyors, planners, contract attorneys and bond attorneys totalling more than $40 million.
The lawsuit contends those actions violate the existing statutory authority. "Defendants' financing plan, to the extent it extends bond payments for more than fifty years, in in excess of its authority under Missouri law," it said.
The suit also says the 11-member RSA is acting illegally because its current membership violates the law, which mandates no more than six members of the same political party." Seven of the current members are listed as Democrats and an eighth member - retired Harris-Stowe University President Henry Givens Jr. - doesn't claim political party membership but, since 2008, "has consistently contributed money exclusively to Democratic candidates for office."
Finally, the lawsuit said, state lawmakers appropriated $12 million "for debt service and maintenance on the Edward Jones Dome project," so the RSA's and Nixon's "actions in using funds to pay for planning construction of a new stadium are in excess of the lawful purpose of the appropriation."
Nanci Gonder, Attorney General Chris Koster's spokeswoman, declined to comment on the lawsuit Wednesday.
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