Muscogee (Creek) Nation gets naming rights for Tulsa's Expo Square

TULSA, Okla. – Tulsa’s iconic Golden Driller statue gets a new neighbor in 2013.

Starting in January, the Muscogee (Creek) Nation will have the naming rights for the Expo Square at the Tulsa Fairgrounds through 2019. In exchange for $1.44 million annually – or $200,000 per month – the building currently known as the QuikTrip Center will become the Muscogee (Creek) Nation Center.

“We see this as a win-win,” Muscogee (Creek) Nation Principal Chief George Tiger said Friday at a press conference at the tribe’s headquarters in Okmulgee, Okla. “We see this as an opportunity to promote not only events at the fairgrounds, but ourselves as well. This is a tool not only for the tribe, but for the Expo Square as well.

“We’re just blessed we can do it. This site is within our original jurisdiction and this can be used as a blueprint for other tribes to do similar partnerships.”

Approved unanimously Thursday by the Tulsa County fair board, the agreement also includes a provision that Fair Meadows, a horse racing track on the fairgrounds’ property, will stop conducting live races. Prior to the Muscogee (Creek) Nation’s new agreement, the track was partially subsidized through a compact with the Cherokee, Muscogee (Creek) and Osage nations, which all have at least one casino within 20 miles of the fairgrounds.

Signed in 2005, the 15-year compact required the three tribes to contribute at least a combined $2 million to the track’s purse fund in exchange for Fair Meadows’ management not installing gaming machines. The agreement was also contingent upon the track hosting at least 400 live races annually during its 34-day season.

Principal Chief George Tiger would not comment on how much the tribe paid annually to the fund other than the Muscogee (Creek) Nation paid more into it than the other two and that the overall savings to the tribe would make up for the seven-figure yearly price tag.

“We see it as a savings,” he said. “Whatever money we were paying out to them before will be coming back into our coffers.”

Over the last seven years, Fair Meadows has lost at least $695,000 each year thanks in part to dwindling attendance. Under the agreement, the fairgrounds board has the option to repurpose the racetrack if it chooses.

“Horse racing’s no longer a spectator sport,” Fair Meadows race director Ron Shotts. “It’s a participant sport. We’re averaging maybe 400 people per day at the track. The facts were what they were.”

The agreement runs through 2019 but will remain in effect beyond that as long as Oklahoma's tribes have a gaming compact with the Remington Park and Will Rogers Downs racetracks in Oklahoma City and Claremore, respectively.

Additionally, the tribe gets first right through 2015 to propose a new use for the old Drillers Stadium at the northeast corner of the fairgrounds. The former home of Tulsa’s minor league baseball team, the stadium has not been used since the end of the 2009 season and any repurposing efforts would be subject to approval by the Tulsa County Fair Board. Creek Nation officials did not announce any new plans for the property at a press conference Friday but did rule out one option.

“I want to say with emphasis that the Muscogee (Creek) Nation will not be building a casino on that site,” Tiger said.

Although the tribe will not be putting in a casino at 15th and Yale, revenue from its gaming facilities made the acquisition possible. The tribe’s two other multi-million dollar real estate purchases this year – the Riverwalk Crossing shopping center in Jenks, Okla., and the Okmulgee Country Club – were paid for through the capitol improvements portion of the tribe’s budget.

“Gaming dollars paid for this (the naming rights),” Tiger said. “Money that was already going to Fair Meadows is paying for this.”