Ms. Hochul, a Democrat, unveiled the agreement just four days before the state budget is due in Albany, leaving state lawmakers a relatively small window to scrutinize the details of the state’s portion of the funding, ultimately deciding whether to accept it. approve.
The grant will make the already arduous negotiations over the state budget even more controversial, with some left-wing democrats from the downstate region who already decry public funding as good for business.
Indeed, the negotiations for a new stadium have sparked a bitter debate over whether the government should get involved in subsidizing arenas for professional sports teams; economic research has shown that sports stadiums have had little or no substantial impact on overall economic growth.
Government aid, in the form of tax breaks and free land, has been used to fund the construction of arenas for New York sports teams, but many of the teams, from the Yankees to the Mets, have self-financed most of the cost. The Giants and Jets, who play in New Jersey, paid for almost the entire stadium, which opened in 2010.
The negotiations also sparked skepticism about whether the Bills would eventually have left New York without a major government grant, though the owners never publicly threatened to uproot the team.
The Bills are owned by Pegula Sports and Entertainment, a company run by Terry and Kim Pegula, a wealthy couple from Western New York; Mr. Pegula, who made his fortune from fracking, has a net worth of $5.8 billion, according to Forbes.
The new open-air stadium, to be built across the street from Bills’ current home in Orchard Park, a suburb of Buffalo, would hold just over 60,000 fans, about 10,000 fewer than the current location. But it would have a larger footprint overall and include about 60 box suites, a more lucrative source of revenue for teams.