New deal for Petes OK’d

Council rejects selling naming rights for Memorial Centre, but will consider idea for replacement arena

The Peterborough Petes are about to receive $315,000 more in Memorial Centre revenues from the city, this season – and the team, which has been struggling with its expenses, can expect the new agreement to stick for years to come.

City councillors unanimously agreed to the new agreement with the OHL team at a meeting at City Hall on Monday night.

No councillors spoke against the idea – everyone said they were happy to help.

Coun. Gary Baldwin said “you can’t put a price on” keeping the Petes in Peterborough.

In the fall, Petes president Dave Pogue told councillors the team was struggling to cover expenses such as the cost of post-secondary educations for their former players.

He said that unless the city agreed to share more Memorial Centre revenues – in other words, money the city rakes in on game nights - then the team would run out of money and have to be sold, likely within four years.

Meanwhile, there’s seven years left in their revenue-sharing agreement with the city.

The city receives about $1 million in revenues every year from items such as tickets sales, parking fees and food and beverage sales on hockey game nights.

In the fall, city staff proposed sharing about $113,000 more with the Petes every year. Councillors asked them to rethink that.

Coun. Dan McWilliams congratulated city staff and Petes business managers on coming up with a new agreement to share $313,500 with the team, annually.

“It’s spectacular the community has come together... the city supports you,” McWilliams told team officials in the public gallery at the meeting.

He said the Petes bring national recognition to the city, and it’s critical to help the team remain in Peterborough.

“That’s called retention,” McWilliams said.

There was only one contentious item of discussion: Councillors didn’t agree on whether it was OK to have city staff examine the possibility of renaming the Memorial Centre arena for a corporate sponsor (if such a sponsor were to come along).

Coun. Dave Haacke wanted staff to write a report on this, but other councillors wouldn’t hear of it.

Coun. Henry Clarke was unequivocal: The arena is a war memorial, and he would never agree to changing its name.

“It would be an aberration to change that name for financial gain,” he said.

Mayor Daryl Bennett suggested that they have staff write a report about potentially renaming the new OHL arena that could be built in the future – and perhaps rename particular rooms in the Memorial Centre, in the meantime.

He said he was also concerned about the idea of renaming a war memorial.

But Coun. Dave Haacke said he didn’t want the city to limit its options. Coun. Andrew Beamer, Coun. Diane Therrien and Don Vassiliadis were all interested in the city looking into renaming the Memorial Centre.

Beamer said maybe the city could have a new war memorial sculpture outside the arena, or plant a memorial garden.

He said time have changed since the Memorial Centre was named, in 1956 – perhaps people would be OK with changing the name.

“I think times – and the economy – are changing,” he said.

Still, he was in the minority – councillors voted against the idea to rename the Memorial Centre. They went with the mayor’s idea to consider renaming the new OHL arena that’s expected to be built in the future, to replace the Memorial Centre (later this year, city staff is to begin a study on when – and where – to build this arena).

Meanwhile, the city hasn’t forgotten the Lakers lacrosse team.

A separate staff report recommends $67,800 more in arena revenues for that team, this season, which fulfills a request previously made by the Lakers.

Councillors didn’t discuss or debate this – they approved the idea on consent, with no discussion.

The plans to help both the Lakers and the Petes were given preliminary approval – ratification is expected at next week’s council meeting.

Coun. Dan McWilliams called it good news for the city and for the Petes. Again, he told the Petes business managers in the gallery that there was “nowhere to go but up” for the team.

“Gentlemen, I thank you for your leadership,” he told them. “This council’s behind you.”