Emotional Jerry Jones dedicates AT&T Stadium atrium in honor of former mayor

Many times since 2009, Robert Cluck had made the walk from an AT&T Stadium parking lot, past the bronze statue of Tom Landry and into the enormous venue to watch the team he was instrumental in bringing to Arlington.

But on this Saturday afternoon, something was different about the atrium. Unbeknownst to him, it was now the “Mayor Robert N. Cluck Atrium.”

That according to a brushed-silver plaque that the former Arlington mayor might have noticed had he not been confronted by an honor posse when he arrived.

About 75 of of his friends, family and current and former colleagues gathered as Cowboys owner Jerry Jones spoke briefly and emotionally about Cluck, whom he credited above anyone else with successfully wooing the Cowboys and their $1.2 billion home field to Arlington.

Both men, who had become great friends during the eight years leading up to the stadium’s grand opening, spent much of Saturday’s ceremony fighting back tears.

“Standing on his shoulders gave us such strength that he believes in us so much that he would ask his constituents and the great people of Arlington to be with us,” Jones said, adding the Cowboys “leveraged that confidence” to help push through the process of getting the stadium approved, funded and built. Jones, with tears getting the best of him, added, “I can truthfully say, Bob, as we call this atrium the Bob Cluck Atrium, there would be no atrium if it weren’t for Bob Cluck.”

Cluck arrived unaware of what was going on, said his wife, Linda, who was the Cowboys’ key conspirator in the surprise.

“He stood there and saw all of these people and it didn’t register,” she said, “even though if he had noticed, they were all friends of his.”

The concept of the Cowboys moving to Arlington was born in 2001, when Cluck, a councilman at the time, first reached out to Jones.

“I read in the paper that he was looking to build a new stadium and Dallas was having a tough time agreeing with him on financing,” Cluck recalled. He expressed that to a mutual friend of Jones’ and soon Jones was on the phone to set up a meeting.

Cluck said he met with Jones and several of Jones’ lawyers for two or three hours.

Cowboys public relations director Rich Dalrymple said that Cluck was planning to run for mayor and that building the stadium in Arlington would be his top economic-development priority.

“He was the original spark of it,” Dalrymple said. “He started talking and Jerry started listening.”

Jerry Jones originally estimated the stadium cost at $650 million, Cluck said. “I said my city could do $325 million” but not a nickel more.

Of course, the stadium’s price tag ballooned to $1.2 billion by the time it opened in 2009.

Cluck says he and Jones were in frequent contact from that first meeting onward. “And he never asked for another penny, but I guess he knew I wouldn’t give him another penny. But it’s been a beautiful relationship. And it’s certainly brought a huge amount of new business to Arlington.”

Jones said he was impressed by Cluck’s determination.

But it would take more than a beautiful friendship to make this new stadium happen in Arlington.

Cluck said he found the City Council receptive to the idea, saying he doesn’t recall “hearing a really negative word,” even though it was clearly going to require a tax increase.

He would hear plenty of those words once city and community leaders launched the extensive campaign to convince voters that building the stadium was a cause worthy of a half-cent sales tax increase.

“I’m not sure I’ve ever worked as hard as I did those several months before the election,” Cluck said.

Added Councilwoman Kathryn Wilemon, who won the council seat that Cluck vacated to run for mayor: “Those kinds of deals don’t happen overnight. There was a lot of long, hard negotiating.”

But it paid off with a relative landslide in November 2004 — about 55 percent of the vote.

The city, which owns the stadium and leases it to the Cowboys, has benefited from a thick revenue stream since the stadium opened in 2009.

It has hosted not only Cowboys games but many and varied sporting and entertainment events, including Super Bowl XLV, the NBA All-Star Game, the NCAA Basketball Final Four, and a world welterweight boxing championship,

Last year, country music superstar George Strait played his career finale at AT&T Stadium to an audience of 104,793, the largest indoor concert crowd in North American history, according to Cowboys statistics.

This year, officials calculated that the higher-than-expected revenue from sales taxes as well as hotel-occupancy, car-rental taxes — also part of the 2004 program voters approved — would enable the city to pay off its stadium debt 10 years ahead of schedule.

“I miss him as mayor,” Jones said, adding that he intended no slight against Jeff Williams, the new mayor, who defeated Cluck in the May election. “It’s just my trust in him. He had everything to do with the speed at which we could move and negotiate. I had not had that kind of relationship ever with any public official.”

This story was originally published December 19, 2015 at 8:21 PM with the headline "Emotional Jerry Jones dedicates AT&T Stadium atrium in honor of former mayor."