LAS VEGAS (AP) — Foundation work on the Athletics' stadium is complete, according to the project director, and officials for the contractor and team told the Las Vegas Stadium Authority on Thursday they remain on target to open before the 2028 season.
It was a similar message in the December meeting with the Stadium Authority.
“We are excited we continue to be on schedule for the project,” said Tyler Van Eeckhaut, project director for contractors Mortenson-McCarthy.
The Stadium Authority also approved the A's request to sell personal-seat licenses, and the Athletics vice chairman Sandy Dean said the team has spent $300 million on the $2 billion, 33,000-person domed ballpark and have yet to request public financing.
While construction takes place on the Las Vegas Strip, the A's are about to play the second of three scheduled seasons at a Triple-A stadium in West Sacramento, California. They played their previous 57 seasons in Oakland, California.
“It's good to be here on a day in which we have a lot of tangible progress to report,” Dean told the Stadium Authority.
Van Eeckhaut provided a detailed update of where construction stands, noting two of the buttresses are finished and work is being done on the lower suite level and main concourse. He said all the buttress work should be completed by May and the vertical construction already in progress should continue.
“I feel great about the progress,” Badain said. “You heard Tyler’s comments in terms of where they are on the schedule, and we’ve pretty much hit every deadline. The county has been great to work with. I feel great about that.”
Dean said the A's haven't decided when they would request public financing. Nevada and Clark County have approved up to $380 million in public funds for the ballpark, and the A’s have said they will cover the remaining expenses. Dean said after the meeting that the A's have attracted some outside investors.
As for the PCLs, A's President Marc Badain told the Stadium Authority they would be for only for “a select number of seats” mostly in the high-end areas. He noted five or six other MLB teams also sells PCLs.
“We researched the market,” Badain said after the meeting. “We have a (season-ticket) deposit list of over 20,000. We reached out to people. The demand was there, so we're going to utilize that to help with the project.”
Badain emphasized to the Stadium Authority there would be a number of seats in the $20 and $30 price range, and there likely will be tickets geared toward attracting families to the ballpark.
The A’s are in spring training in Mesa, Arizona, but will play the Los Angeles Angels in two preseason games in Las Vegas on March 7-8. The club also will return to play six regular-season games at Las Vegas Ballpark — home of the Athletics’ Triple-A affiliate — in June against the Milwaukee Brewers and Colorado Rockies.
Badain said tickets for the regular-season games were first offered to those who put down deposits for Las Vegas A's season tickets and sold out in 24 hours. More tickets will be put on sale later, he said.
Ceremonial groundbreaking on the stadium located on the Las Vegas Strip occurred June 23. The A’s Ballpark Experience Center in Las Vegas opened in December to give fans a chance to view the stadium in detail and take part in other immersive experiences.
AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb
Athletics pitchers Mason Barnett, left, talks with Joey Estes, center, as they join other pitchers for workouts during spring training baseball Monday, Feb. 16, 2026, in Mesa, Ariz. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)
FILE - A person takes a picture near construction equipment during a groundbreaking ceremony for the Athletics' baseball stadium, June 23, 2025, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher, File)
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Australia’s most decorated living veteran, Ben Roberts-Smith, did not apply for bail when the war crime murder charges against him were listed in a Sydney court Wednesday.
Roberts-Smith was awarded both the Victoria Cross and Medal of Gallantry for his service in Afghanistan and is only the second Australian veteran of the Afghanistan campaign to be charged with a war crime.
The charges follow a military report released in 2020 that found evidence elite Australian Special Air Service and commando regiment troops unlawfully killed 39 Afghan prisoners, farmers and other noncombatants. Around 40,000 Australian military personnel served in Afghanistan between 2001 and 2021, of whom 41 were killed.
The allegations against Roberts-Smith relate to the deaths of five Afghan people who died in 2009 and 2012 while he served in Afghanistan as an elite SAS corporal. Police allege he either shot his victims or ordered a subordinate to shoot them in Oruzgan province where Australia's forces were based.
Police said he had been charged Tuesday with five counts of war crime murder. But the charges laid in court Wednesday were were two counts of war crime murder and three counts of aiding or abetting a war crime murder. All charges carry the same potential maximum sentence of life in prison.
The charges allege Roberts-Smith killed and caused a subordinate to kill at Kakarak village on April 12, 2009. He allegedly caused a subordinate to kill at Darwan village on Sept. 11, 2012. He allegedly killed and caused a subordinate to kill at Syahchow village on Oct. 20, 2012.
Australian law defines war crime murder as the intentional killing in a context of armed conflict of a person who is not taking an active part in the hostilities, such as a civilian, prisoner of war or a wounded soldier.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described Roberts-Smith's arrest as a “difficult time” for the Australian Defense Force.
“We should give thanks every day for the men and women who wear our uniform, who are prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice on behalf of our nation, to keep our Australian way of life going forward. That doesn’t change,” Albanese told Sky News television.
“It’s important that this not be politicized, and I have no intention of commenting on what is a legal process,” Albanese added.
Opposition leader Angus Taylor called on the federal government to pay for the legal defenses of all military personnel prosecuted for war crimes, including Roberts-Smith.
“It is an imperative that the Commonwealth provide anyone who’s prosecuted in this process, including Ben Roberts-Smith, with ... the financial support they need to defend themselves and to ensure that there is a fair trial,” Taylor told reporters. “The presumption of innocence is crucial.”
Roberts-Smith, 47, spent the night in jail after he was arrested at the Sydney Airport on Tuesday morning, and he did not appear in court either in person or by video link Wednesday.
His lawyers did not enter pleas to the charges or apply for his release on bail. The case was adjourned until June 4.
A civil court has already found similar allegations against Roberts-Smith credible in a defamation suit he brought after newspapers published articles in 2018 accusing him of a range of war crimes. In 2023, a federal judge rejected Roberts-Smith’s claims and ruled that he likely killed four noncombatants unlawfully in 2009 and 2012.
But while the civil court found the war crimes allegations were mostly proven on a balance of probabilities, the war crime murder charges would have to be proved in a criminal court to a higher standard of beyond reasonable doubt.
Media magnate Kerry Stokes helped fund Roberts-Smith's civil court action. Roberts-Smith quit his job as a state manager of Stokes' Seven West Media in 2023 after losing the defamation case.
Roberts-Smith is the second Australian veteran of the Afghanistan campaign to be charged with a war crime.
Former SAS soldier Oliver Schulz has pleaded not guilty to a charge of war crime murder. He is accused of shooting Afghan man Dad Mohammad three times in the head in an Uruzgan province wheat field in 2012.
Prosecutors and defense lawyers said Schulz's trial is unlikely to be held before 2027.
FILE - Britain's Queen Elizabeth II greets Corp. Ben Roberts-Smith from Australia, who was recently awarded the Victoria Cross, during an audience at Buckingham Palace in London, Nov. 15, 2011. (Anthony Devlin/Pool via AP, File)
FILE - Ben Roberts-Smith arrives at the Federal Court in Sydney, Australia, on June 9, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)
