Hammons offer raises new questions

After reading newspaper articles and watching television reports about the problems associated with Chicago-based Horn Chen's and St. Louis-based Group Seven's Jordan Valley ice arena proposals, John Q. Hammons offered city officials a new option at an Aug. 29 press conference.

Hammons withdrew a 3-year-old offer to build an exposition center on the former Thompson Pontiac-Cadillac lot next to the Hammons Tower office building, and instead he offered to build an ice arena complete with 40,000 square feet of exposition space on the lot. He has until Sept. 6 to submit a proposal to the city for review by the city's tax increment financing commission.

Chen and Tony Sansone Jr.'s Group Seven have until the same date to notify the city if they want the TIF commission to consider their arena proposals as they stand, or if they plan to make the necessary changes to meet the industry standards outlined in a review by Minnesota-based Ankeny Kell Architects. The firm was commissioned by the arena selection committee to provide a comparison report of the two proposals, according to Mary Lilly Smith, economic development coordinator for the city.

The firm had "significant concerns" with both Chen's and Sansone's proposals, according to the report, which was released Aug. 25.

"When the city selects someone, (Chen or Group Seven) will go through the whole redesign process then. I don't think anyone expects the developers to pay out the costs of a redesign at this point," Smith said.

The 10-member arena selection committee comprised of the Center City Development Committee, council, city staff and a private engineer, hired Ankeny Kell after eliminating Nustadia Developments' proposal June 27 and determining the committee did not have the expertise to discover the reasons for the $7 million price difference between Chen's $17 million proposal and Group Seven's $24 million proposal. Ankeny Kell is the architect for the city's $7 million recreational ice complex to be located in Jordan Valley Park.

Hammons also announced plans for a $15 million, 10,000-seat baseball stadium to be located at the northeast corner of Trafficway and Hammons Parkway. The stadium would house a yet-to-be-determined Double-A minor league baseball team and serve as the home of Southwest Missouri State University's baseball team and be complete by March 2003. He also spoke of renovating the University Plaza Trade Center building and adding rooms to the University Plaza Holiday Inn.

Hammons also spoke of razing the University Plaza Trade Center parking garage adjacent to the former Thompson site and building a new garage that would provide up to 1,600 new parking spaces for the park. He said a parking lot near the stadium would provide 840 spaces to the area.

Other available parking near the park will consist of street parking, 250 spaces in a lot next to the city's recreational ice complex and a possible 1,300-car city garage near the Walgreens at St. Louis and National. A study commissioned by the city to determine the park's parking needs is due this week.

"I've said this from day one we need at least 3,000 parking spaces," Hammons said.

City Manager Tom Finnie said at a City Council luncheon the same day of Hammons' announcement that the state TIF would pay for park infrastructure improvements, such as parking and lighting.

"That's what the TIF is for, to pay for infrastructure improvements ... 70 to 80 percent of that will be parking," Finnie said.

Finnie also said Hammons told him that he would assume responsibility for the arena's debt obligation for the 20- to 25-year bonds issued for the project's funding, which addresses the issue of the arena's long-term financing for the city.

At the luncheon, council members seemed pleased with the combined arena-expo center concept after Ankeny Kell's report that both Chen's and Sansone's proposals had problems.

Tom Betti of Ankeny Kell presented the report and answered questions at the council luncheon. Specifically, Ankeny Kell's concerns with both proposals are, according to the report:

(They) seem to be a work in progress and are not complete enough in many areas to perform a thorough review of the complete building;

Both proposals are below the average construction cost for buildings of this magnitude;

Substantial revisions are required to the plans to meet industry standards for a variety of criteria, such as sightlines, seating, operations, etc.;

The back-of-house functions seem very inadequate, and a group with operations expertise should be consulted;

The site is very restricting for access and building service.

Betti estimated a multipurpose arena to serve the city's needs would cost in the neighborhood of $35 million, and that cost could go up if exposition space is included.

The report found Group Seven's proposal closest to industry standards, however, the report stated, "the (Group Seven) design will require substantial revisions to meet industry standards and the needs of the city."

Ankeny Kell recommended the city establish a review process so it has an opportunity to review and understand the design, cost and operations implications as the design and proposal further develops and hire a full-time consultant or staff member who has experience in project management and arena design, construction and operations. The firm also recommended including an arena/event promotion company, food service and acoustical consultants with the design and development team.

Councilman Ralph Manley said he thought it would be best to go back to the drawing board with the ice arena concept rather than accept a project that could end up becoming a "white elephant."