Arena figures in MAPS 4 plans
MAPS 4 could direct $120 million to $135 million toward upgrades and expansion of Chesapeake Energy Arena and improvements of the cityowned Oklahoma City Thunder practice facility.
Keeping the city's arena competitive among NBA teams and on the concert circuit was the focus of one of four MAPS 4 presentations reviewed by the city council Tuesday.
The eight-hour meeting included presentations on transit, homelessness and affordable housing, and a center for diverting individuals facing incarceration in the county jail to alternatives.
The meeting was the third of four on MAPS 4 ideas.
Like the first two in mid July, it drew hundreds of advocates to City Hall, with several dozen making remarks, mostly in favor of proposed projects.
The series of review sessions wraps up on Tuesday.
The council will then settle on a budget and slate of projects to promise to residents. Voters ultimately decide whether to extend the 1-cent MAPS sales tax for MAPS 4.
Tom Anderson, special projects manager in the city manager' s office, told the council the arena is the engine behind $90 million in direct spending annually in the local economy. It is the home of the NBA's Thunder and, he said, an increasingly busy concert venue.
The arena was an original MAPS project and opened in 2002.
Many of the ideas for MAPS 4 investments are geared toward enhancing amenities for basketball fans, such as wider concourses and new eating and drinking options, expanding the building's footprint by 70,000
square feet.
Locker rooms would get a makeover, in part to accommodate the increasing number of women being hired in roles, including NBA coaches.
A new scoreboard and larger video screens offering higher definition and greater clarity would replace current technology; seats and elevators would be replaced.
The Thunder's initial 15-year lease expires about the time the arena hits 20 years of age.
Oklahoma City is the NBA's third-smallest market.
Ward 6 Councilwoman JoBeth Hamon asked whether the city would “lose them if we don't keep up, keep competitive.”
City Manager Craig Freeman said there was no threat from the Thunder, which has five threeyear options once the initial lease expires.
“With this, it is a matter of taking care of what we have,” said Freeman. “We need to continue to invest in the building to be able to keep the team and for it to be a good fan experience.”
Mayor David Holt said he imagined “we're going to have a pretty substantive conversation in the next three years as that first 15-year term ends.”
“We all are going to be on one side of the table and the Thunder
are going to be on the other,” he said.
“I have no reason to think that's a contentious negotiation but every time you come to the table with a facility that's not up to speed and doesn't have the promise of being brought up to current standards, then your hand is weaker.”
Hamon said team owners could put more toward keeping the arena competitive.
“When a lot of the money that the organization is paying for is for people who make millions and millions of dollars, I just have a hard time saying, `Let's cut animal shelter or let's cut transit,' when we have people who spoke today that transit is a vital thing for them to be able to participate in society,' she said.
“It feels like something on the scales was not balanced. I'd be really interested in finding a way to say maybe this is a thing we can trim from.
“The people who own them have a lot of money already, they've already gotten a leg up,” Hamon said. “When we're talking about how to make this fit in what our projections are, I just want to think about how can we maybe ask them to take a little bit more of a hit than, say, the single mom who's trying to make ends meet.”