Minnesota — not just St. Paul — stands to lose if state lawmakers fail to act promptly to support straightforward requests needed for a new soccer stadium in the Midway.

The city of St. Paul is asking for continuation of existing property-tax exemption for the site, which already has been off the tax roles for about a half-century. Also requested are sales-tax exemption for construction equipment and permission for the stadium to sell liquor.

This opportunity for St. Paul must not slip away. If it does, other soccer-hungry cities around the nation stand ready to grab a franchise.

Before the Senate Taxes Committee last week, Minnesota United team owner Dr. William McGuire was asked about the outcome, if lawmakers fail to act: “I think it would be very problematic and a high possibility — if not probability — that the franchise would be lost without this,” he told lawmakers.

Competition is keen, and it comes from “anywhere else in the country” that wants a franchise, St. Paul Area Chamber of Commerce President Matt Kramer told us.

If the St. Paul deal falters, soccer advocates, it’s said, will move on rather than wait another year or more for the Legislature to act.

The tax exemptions are routine. “Both of those asks were just a given in every other conversation about stadiums,” Mayor Chris Coleman told us.

The tax provisions are “essential to the success of bringing professional soccer home to Minnesota,” soccer-bill sponsor Sen. Sandra Pappas, a St. Paul Democrat, told the committee. They are assumed — “pieces of other stadium bills we never talk about.”

It’s a stadium deal unlike any other we’ve seen, Coleman told the committee. The team will finance the $150 million, 20,000-seat facility, and it will be publicly owned once construction is complete.

As Kramer reminds us, “this is the only stadium being built with private money. That is incredibly unique in the debate we’ve been having for the last 10 years in Minnesota” about such facilities.

At hand is a “catalytic” opportunity for St. Paul. Soccer on the site, which includes the former Metro Transit “bus barn” storage facility near Snelling and University avenues, would spur development and revitalize the surrounding neighborhood, Kramer said. It would turn land “sitting fallow in the heart of the city” into property that generates jobs and provides paychecks that allow people to put money back into the economy.

It’s called the Midway for a reason. St. Paul made its case — and won — stressing the heart-of-the-Twin Cities location between both downtowns with the advantage of transportation access via the Green Line, I-94 and Snelling Avenue bus rapid-transit. And, with its many college campuses not far from the site, St. Paul also is poised to deliver the young and diverse group that will help the team build its fan base for the future.

St. Paul’s soccer game plan should be on pace to victory at the Capitol. “It’s an easy ask,” Coleman told us.

But the tax terrain is challenging, Pappas explains. “I think the biggest barrier is if House Republicans decide that they want to use large, permanent corporate tax cuts for negotiations.”

Senate Democrats “will not negotiate for permanent tax cuts. We don’t see a horizon rosy enough to be able to do that,” she said, explaining that “if we were inclined politically, it’s just too risky” to return to the deficits of a decade ago.

Nor should lawmakers put at risk a new statewide asset that will add jobs and contribute to vitality. St. Paul’s soccer ask deserves an affirmative answer — this session. The Midway is ready for its makeover.