Arlington's City Council voted 7-2 Tuesday to approve amendments to the city's lease extension agreement with the Dallas Cowboys at AT&T Stadium. Nikkie Hunter and Bowie Hogg cast the two no votes, the same pair who opposed the original lease extension in April.

The changes narrow what city dollars can pay for, limiting Arlington's contribution to the actual costs of maintaining, operating and managing the stadium. The Cowboys remain on the hook to fund and complete the broader slate of improvements outlined in the original agreement by 2043. City Manager Trey Yelverton told council members the split was intentional: "Our dollars go to maintenance and operation... the team's dollars go into improvements," following weeks of consultation with bond attorneys and the Texas Attorney General's office.

The underlying deal, approved in April, stretches the Cowboys' lease at the stadium from 2040 to 2055 and commits up to $273 million in venue-tax-funded reimbursement for stadium upgrades. That money comes from special venue taxes Arlington voters approved more than two decades ago and renewed in 2016 to help build the nearby baseball stadium; those taxes remain authorized through 2048. The city paid off the original football stadium's construction loan in August 2025, a decade ahead of schedule.

The lease extension has not gone unchallenged. A lawsuit filed in June by Voters' Voice of Arlington names Mayor Jim Ross and Yelverton personally, arguing residents deserved a direct vote on a deal of this size. A district court judge recently declined to dismiss the case, setting a non-jury trial for May 31, 2027. City attorneys have declined to say whether this week's amendments were crafted with that pending litigation in mind.

The deal still requires the city to satisfy a list of closing conditions and win sign-off from the Texas Attorney General's office before it becomes final. Ross has defended the broader arrangement by pointing to voters' 2004 approval of the taxes behind the stadium. For now, the amended terms move forward alongside the broader 2055 lease, with final approval still pending state sign-off and the legal question of whether voters should have had the final say unlikely to be settled before next football season.