Raise the Hammer

Here is the link to an editorial titled "Now, bring on the velodrome" by Howard Elliott in today's Hamilton Spectator: http://www.thespec.com/opinion/editorial...

After passing the motion at yesterday's city council meeting to spend $60.5 Million on the Ivor Wynne Pan Am Stadium project, a motion was carried directing city manager Chris Murray to contact the federal Minister of State for Sport, Gary Lunn, to request federal funding for the velodrome similar to the amount of $22.5 Million provided by the Ontario government for the stadium last Sunday. While this makes sense, what happens if the federal government turns down the request?

The original Pan Am financial commitment made by Hamilton city council in February, 2009 was a total of $60 Million comprised of $45 Million for stadium construction, $10 Million to acquire the west harbour lands, and $5 Million for a temporary velodrome. Yesterday, council effectively agreed to spend all of that money on the Ivor Wynne Stadium refurbishment project.

It would therefore appear that, if no federal government funding is forthcoming for the velodrome, Hamilton city council will enter a new debate on whether to spend new monies on a permanent or temporary velodrome.

An interesting side note to yesterday's events is that, according to the National Post article by Mark Masters, the City of Mississauga had withdrawn its interest in the "community-sized" Pan Am soccer stadium sweepstakes earlier in the day. http://sports.nationalpost.com/2011/01/3...

This means that, had Hamilton city council kept its Plan B west harbour 5,000 seat scalable stadium option alive, they would have had the option of committing a $18.9 share of the $43 Million estimated stadium construction costs with $26.1 remaining from the original Future Fund stadium construction allocation to pay its share of the cost of a permanent velodrome with some money left over to contribute to incremental improvements to Ivor Wynne Stadium. Even though Hamilton city council would have still probably proceeding with the Ivor Wynne Pan Am Stadium refurbishment project given the recent injection of provincial money, it would still have been prudent for council to at least consider the fact that Hamilton's Plan B no longer faced any competition and would have made municipal available for the permanent velodrome if the federal government turns down their funding request.

Comment edited by RenaissanceWatcher on 2011-02-01 08:55:41