(NewsNation) — American taxpayers who are feeling the pinch of being asked to pitch in on state-of-the-art sports stadium projects are creating major roadblocks against billionaire team owners, who are asking for more money than ever before.

Since 2020, U.S. residents have been asked for at least $500 million per stadium building or renovation plan, a bump of $150 million from 2010, researchers found.

The price tags on these multi-billion dollar sports Meccas promise strong economic boosts to the cities and states where new stadiums are built. But not everyone is buying it.

Voters soundly defeated a ballot measure in Kansas City seeking public funds for two stadium projects for the MLB’s Royals and the NFL Super Bowl Champion Chiefs last month.

In New Jersey, Gov. Phil Murphy allocated $15 million in federal COV ID-19 funds to help lure a World Cup soccer match to MetLife Stadium while New York state officials tried to dip into the same pool of money to make $11.6 million worth of improvements to a New York Yankees minor league stadium.

But after residents pushed back, the money was reallocated to local housing developments.

Marc Ganis, a Chicago-based stadium consultant, says these examples are the latest proof that obtaining taxpayer help has become more difficult.

Ganis told NewsNation that in addition to rising costs, the closing of a window on what he calls the “sugar-high” of available public funds has brought teams asking for help crashing back to reality.

“Governments are now trying to figure out how to pay for all those things they paid for with the COVID relief funds without raising taxes exorbitantly,” Ganis said. “When on top of that, you try to add more money for stadiums and arenas, it becomes a tougher sell.”

Owners sometimes threaten to pull up stakes if they don’t receive funding like the NHL’s Arizona Coyotes did this year, but a team leaving town isn’t always enough to convince taxpayers to pay up.

Pricey stadium plans face uphill battle

In Chicago, the NFL’s Bears have unveiled plans for an estimated $4.8 billion domed stadium project along Lake Michigan’s shore that the team says could host major events and concert series that will bolster the local and state economy to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars each year.

But the plan — along with one for a new multi-billion dollar ballpark for the Chicago White Sox — has been met with immediate opposition. Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and a Lake Michigan preservation group indicated stadium projects shouldn’t take priority over other initiatives that serve a greater public good.

“Look, I’m a Bears fan. I want to be clear. I want them to win and have a great place to play, but I just think that the taxpayer dollars need to be protected,” Pritzker told reporters after the Bears unveiled their stadium plans, calling the project as it was introduced a “non-starter.”

Bears President and CEO Kevin Warren says his confidence hasn’t wavered and overcoming opposition is part of the blueprint.

“I don’t think there has ever been a stadium built …from the first time (people) came forward everyone said, ‘That’s the greatest idea,’” Warren said in an April radio interview. “It just doesn’t work that way.”

A Pritzker spokesman told NewsNation last week that the governor’s position has not changed.

Despite roadblocks in some cities, other plans are finding success. Nashville city officials OK’d a new $2.1 billion stadium for the NFL’s Tennessee Titans, which includes an estimated $1.26 billion in public funding.

Once completed, the project will be part of a 130-acre tax capture zone that the mayor’s office told Center Square will collect $3.1 billion in taxes to cover the expense of construction, maintenance, renovations, and infrastructure over the life of the 30-year lease.

Yet, despite the projections, local taxpayers will be on the hook for a record $1,26 billion, which shattered the previous high of $850 million in public funding that was approved for the building of a new Buffalo Bills stadium in suburban Orchard Park. Like in Nashville, the project was approved without voters having a say.

Are stadiums economic drivers or taxpayer ‘cons’?

Dennis Coates, an economics professor at the University of Maryland-Baltimore County, said rather than paying for their own projects, teams use glitzy pitches to “con taxpayers into redistributing their income to the billionaire owners of sports franchises.”

“Teams trot out the same tired and widely debunked claims of economic development and, for the most part, get local politicians to subsidize them,” Coates told NewsNation.

J.C. Bradbury, an economics professor at Kennesaw State University, said another boom of stadium projects is likely coming in the next few years. But ultimately, he said, stadium projects rarely become wise public investments.

Coates said that doesn’t prevent cities from asking, although they may eventually grow weary of the battle.

“Every few years it appears that sanity about stadium subsidies takes hold for a short period,” Coates told NewsNation. “Then sanity wanes and even larger subsidies return.”

Vegas looking to add second publically funded stadium

In Las Vegas, taxpayers are being asked to help cover the cost of a new stadium for a second time.

Since 2016, Las Vegas has added the NFL’s Raiders, NHL’s Golden Knights, and WNBA’s Aces in a flurry of sports activity that included $750 million in public funding for Allegiant Stadium, which hosted this year’s Super Bowl.

Last year, the Nevada legislature approved $380 million more in public funding for a $1.5 billion baseball stadium to potentially host the Oakland Athletics beginning in 2027. NewsNation affiliate KLAS has reported that public stadium funding will not be on the November ballot.

Opposition to the new ballpark has been louder than it was for the Raiders, a political action committee made up of local teachers filed a lawsuit over the public funding for the new A’s ballpark. The other Las Vegas stadium, T-Mobile Arena that’s home to the Golden Knights and Aces, was privately funded.

Despite opposition, city officials continue to preach the benefits pro franchises provide despite promised economic benefits that Ganis, the stadium expert, says should always be taken with a grain of salt.

“It’s really the haves and the have-nots,” Christina Giunchigliani, former Clark County Board told the New York Times. “If they really wanted to diversify the economy, does sports add a component? Yes. But they didn’t need public tax dollars to do it.”