Kathy Courtney was merely a college kid with a cause.
A student vice president at Syracuse University, she campaigned in 1979 to name the soon-to-open Carrier Dome not for its corporate sponsor, but for Ernie Davis, the first Black player to win the Heisman Trophy but who died of leukemia before he could make his NFL debut.
Courtney's efforts couldn't convince the powers that be, yet she never could have imagined that 42 years later she would have anything to do with another football stadium, let alone become a power broker who helped bring a state-of-the-art venue to her hometown.
Kathy Courtney eventually became Kathy Hochul, who in 2021 -- stunningly -- ascended to New York governor just as her beloved Buffalo Bills were beginning to explore relocation because of stunted stadium-lease negotiations predecessor, Andrew M. Cuomo, who later resigned amid a sexual harassment scandal.
This weekend, Hochul will visit Western New York for a special football weekend. She will attend the University at Buffalo's home opener Saturday night to watch her nephew, Jack Courtney, play for visiting St. Francis (Pa.) and then the Bills' season opener Sunday night against the Baltimore Ravens in Orchard Park, N.Y.
There, across Abbott Road, it will be easy to glimpse the Bills' colossal, $2.4 billion stadium scheduled to open for next season.
Without Hochul's involvement, the franchise was at risk of moving away, multiple Bills sources and local politicians told The Athletic. A government source briefed on the discussions said Austin, Orlando and San Diego were mentioned. Cuomo's inaction with the Bills' expiring lease on a crumbling stadium infuriated team executives. But when nearly a dozen sexual harassment allegations prompted his resignation, Lt. Gov. Hochul was sworn in.
"I don't think she gets enough credit in Western New York for what she did," said Dave Courtney, her younger brother. "People just take it for granted. This was not bound by fate to get done."
Hochul took office in August 2021. Seven months later came a controversial 30-year lease agreement. The stadium initially was projected to cost $1.4 billion, with the state assuming venue ownership and kicking in $650 million to help build it. Erie County, owner of the current stadium, added another $250 million. The Pegula family would pay the rest, including overruns. The working number for the stadium's final price tag is currently $2.2 billion.
A group of about 50 friends and family members will huddle Saturday at a UB Stadium tailgate. Jack Courtney, a fifth-year senior and starting defensive tackle for St. Francis, was born and raised in Virginia but considers Western New York his origin story. He was baptized at Saints Peter and Paul Church, the Courtney family parish in Hamburg.
The party won't need to appeal to Hochul for help to enjoy their festivities, as was the case in October 2023. In what Dave Courtney called his sister's "finest work" as governor, she directed the New York State Liquor Authority to allow alcohol sales at 8 a.m. to accommodate the early Sunday kickoff against the Jacksonville Jaguars in London.
Courtney, a lifelong conservative, is quick to engage those who express political aggravations toward his sister. Hochul is a Democrat, but she's also a native Western New Yorker and a diehard Bills fan. That stands for a lot around here.
"She grew up down the street," Courtney said. "She's one of us. Who would you rather have in the governor's mansion, someone from Manhattan or someone from Long Avenue in Hamburg?"
Hochul, on Wednesday, spoke with The Athletic about her love of the Bills, her thoughts on the new stadium and how football can be a uniting force across party lines.
Why does football mean so much to your family?
It's a way of life. It's a topic of conversation about eight months a year. When you grow up in Hamburg, minutes from the stadium, if you wanted to participate in Sunday dinners, you better know the Bills' score, what they did and who made the plays, or else you sat there silently. I had four brothers and a father, and when a grandpa and his six sons would come over for family gatherings, it's all we talked about.
It's a point of reference to my childhood that continues with me today. I see my adult siblings -- and their children and grandchildren, turning into rabid Bills fans even though they've wandered far away from the homeland -- it's a bonding connection that never leaves you. My granddaughter, who's six weeks old down in Washington, is probably already wearing the Bills onesies I sent her. Even though her father is a Commanders fan, that's just not going to happen. We're true, blue Buffalo Bills fans.
How much football did you play?
The family's annual Turkey Bowl was played up at Frontier High School every Thanksgiving. When I was 5 years old, that was probably the first game they let me play in. I had my big uncles, who'd all been athletes, and my older brother. We have video of me -- probably those 8-millimeter films -- being handed the ball to run down the field, but I went the wrong direction. The family still cheered me on. We would play in front of my grandparents' tiny house on Wilson Drive in Hamburg, right near Seven Corners, where they raised eight kids. That's where the games originated. I remember them fondly, two-hand touch until the boys got too aggressive.
As this gargantuan stadium is being built 4 miles away from where you went to high school, are you able to separate the kid who grew up a Bills fan from the governor who was so instrumental to making the deal happen?
First of all, I never dreamed I'd be governor. So let's put that out there. That was not in my game plan. I'm delighted to be New York's governor, but that's not something you plan for over the decades.
To be in that position, in that moment in history, when we needed someone to step up with the courage to do something that was not popular, as a brand new governor with a legislature mostly from downstate and who did not understand the economic value, which was enormous, but also the emotional value of having this team remain in Western New York.
Right away, I had to do my first budget, deliver my first State of the State address, build a cabinet, run for election. But the weight of my hometown on my shoulders -- because I could not go back home having let the Bills get away -- was enormous. I look back, and I'm really glad I got through it.
My Bills and local political sources told me throughout the process that if Andrew Cuomo hadn't resigned, there were serious concerns the stadium would not have been built because his aloofness caused so much frustration. As his lieutenant governor, what was your view of that time?
I had been hearing rumblings there was not communication between the former administration at the time and the Pegula organization, and their lease was coming up, and they were anxious, and they needed answers, and I think there'd been a lot of distractions in Albany at the time, and there hadn't been any attention paid to this, and we became aware (the Bills) were talking to other communities.
So when I first found out that in 10 days I was going to be the governor -- unexpectedly while watching television and they made the announcement -- I called (Bills owners) Terry and Kim Pegula even before I was sworn in. I wanted to let them know who I was and that I would not be the governor who had on her tombstone, "She let the Bills get away." That's nothing I could have endured.
I took it very seriously and put a lot of energy into it, knowing what the Bills meant not just to the identity of Western New York and Central New York, but also what it meant to a place like Buffalo that does not want to be known just for rough winters. Regardless of your political beliefs, the Bills are a unifying experience.
Given the negative response you knew you'd receive downstate, how much did you consider that working on and approving this new Bills stadium deal could hurt your chances of being elected governor in 2022?
I was very aware of that. At one point, I said, "Why does this lease have to be up now? It's been here for decades. Why does it have to be up as I'm just getting started on the job?" But I had a lot of things happen. You just meet the challenge in front of you. We had the worst shooting in our state's history in Buffalo after I'd been in office only half a year as well. I managed so much pain happening in my hometown and was there often and brought resources.
I would say that growing up in Buffalo has toughened me up to just deal with whatever comes your way. You figure stuff out. I really have that same optimistic attitude to solving the problems of our state. Things that people think are insurmountable, I do not. We'll get together and figure it out. There's an inner toughness and a resiliency that comes from not only being raised in Buffalo, but when you're a hardcore Bills fan, you always have to find the silver lining and gut it out and keep hope alive.
The original price tag was estimated at $1.4 billion and has since risen to $2.2 billion, with the potential to go higher before the project is completed next year. With the Bills paying for all cost overruns, how has your view of the deal changed?
That was how I spent Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve my first year as governor -- not at the family dinner table, but making some hard calls, trying to negotiate the terms.
To me, some were non-negotiable. They had to stay here for 30 years. I want my grandchildren to grow up as Buffalo Bills fans. Longevity was critically important. And with cost escalations, I wasn't going to put New York taxpayers on the hook for cost overruns. This was before inflation was on top of everybody's minds because it came so hard and hit us so quickly.
But I'm prouder of the deal as the costs go up. Our share of $650 million, when you compare it to other stadiums, in retrospect, is one of the better deals in terms of public dollars. We calculated then -- and I think now the number would be even better -- that after 17 years, we would pay for this stadium with just the state income tax on the players' salaries.
Why do billionaire sports owners need public assistance to build stadiums at all, especially when they're selling personal seat licenses?
Because we are in a very competitive environment. Why do we have to give incentives to have 50,000 jobs at Micron? Because they'd go to another state if we didn't. It's that simple.
This is an economic decision. It's a calculation based on other states that are putting literally free stadiums in front of them, paid for by their taxpayers, because they know the economic benefit, the ripple effect of tourism, of merchandise, the income tax on player salaries. We are in a very competitive environment, and there are so many cities and states that would do anything to be able to recruit the Buffalo Bills. Owners absolutely know this.
The calculation was that, for an amount that is appearing more modest than first glance, and it's a lot of money, but compared to other public dollars that are being spent across the country, I'll stand by this decision because the money will flow back to our state coffers.
You and Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz have said that your initial preference was for the stadium to be built in the city. What changed your mind?
It was a lot of new opportunity. There was talk of bringing them downtown to where the Perry Street projects are. That's an enormous area, and that could have been the stadium, but I'm proud we were able to convert that into beautiful homes for people and remove that eyesore. I've stopped by a number of times to welcome people into the neighborhood.
There were talks of making it a year-round convention site attached to a dome stadium and all these wonderful things and hosting a Super Bowl one day, but their surveys didn't match with what Bills Mafia wanted. It would have sanitized the experience. Where would there be huge parking lots for tailgating? They weren't there. When you move everything indoors, it takes away the advantage we have of being beasts in the blizzard.
They had a path that might have even been more lucrative -- I don't know -- to have year-round entertainment and activities there, but they went with what the fans wanted, and Kim was all about the fans.
Kim Pegula's health has prevented her from taking part in the stadium's launch -- all the ceremonies and unveilings and milestones. What was her involvement like before her cardiac arrest?
I love Kim Pegula. I just love her. She was a driving force in that organization. She was very involved in decisions about where the Bills will play, dome or no dome. They were all about what the fans wanted.
I spent a lot of time on the phone with her those first few months of negotiations. It was a lot of tough, tough negotiations, and a lot of it was Kim and me at the very end. When we needed something done on a deadline ... I will say women have a unique way of getting things done sometimes. We worked through challenges. She was a visionary for that team.
There's been a lot of emotion tied up with Kim and her health and our love for her. It's amazing how strong Terry and the family have been in stepping up. It's hard.
As the NFL's only franchise in the state, what impact do the Bills make in New York beyond the 716 and 585 area codes?
I go to Jets and Giants games, but there's not a question in anybody's mind, if they're ever playing the Bills, where my loyalties are. I wear my Bills clothes when I walk around the Meadowlands, and some games, it feels like half the fans are from Buffalo. It's like a big party.
I have my Bills bar in New York City. When I was first looking for an apartment a year and a half ago, I'm walking around, and I see this Buffalo Bills flag sticking out of this building, a place called Bravest. This wasn't just because the Bills were playing at the time. This was a year-round Bills bar. I go inside, and there's Bills flags on the ceiling, pictures everywhere. This is where I decided to get my apartment, half a block away, so I walk to and from my games. It is an insanely fun place to be when the Bills are on. There are a lot of ex-pats. I sit at the bar, and a girl who went to my high school comes up to me, people who went to school with my kids. There's this connection, all the highs and lows that you can share with people.
One thing I want to do is unite upstate and downstate as governor -- the first from Buffalo since Grover Cleveland and the first upstate governor in over a hundred years. I thought if there's something that could be unifying, then it's the Bills. There's a lot of love for the team throughout the state. I've started to train people in New York City that, during Bills season, you don't say "hi" or "goodbye." You say "Go Bills." I go into big meetings. I go into conventions, all sorts of gatherings in Manhattan and elsewhere. They know when it's football season, they all say "Go Bills" to me.