EDMONTON COUNCIL GIVES TENTATIVE OK TO ARENA DEAL
Still $55 million short of total cost of $480 million
EDMONTON — A boost in provincial infrastructure funding will pay almost half the final $100 million needed to build Edmonton’s downtown arena, but some councillors fear the city could be stuck with the remainder.
Edmonton’s share of the Municipal Sustainability Initiative (MSI) was $3 million higher than expected in the March 7 provincial budget, which would cover annual payments on a $45-million loan, city manager Simon Farbrother said Wednesday.
The increase, based on population, education property taxes and kilometres of roads, isn’t earmarked for any other project, he said before councillors tentatively approved the arena master agreement with Oilers owner Daryl Katz.
“We do believe that is a way of dealing with a portion of the $100-million situation,” Farbrother said.
The city has agreed to put $140 million into the $480-million facility, along with $125 million from a ticket tax and the equivalent of $115 million over a 35-year lease with Katz.
Although both sides planned for the province to provide the remaining $100 million, Premier Alison Redford has repeatedly stated her government won’t provide any direct funding.
While the new MSI cash goes partway toward overcoming the financial gap, councillors put off signing legal papers to complete the project until they clarify the source of the remaining $55 million.
The alternative is to push ahead and put the city on the hook for that money, Farbrother said.
“We’re recommending that with
I think it changes some of the commitments I have made. BEN HENDERSON
the clock ticking … at some point you either have to say you’re going to wait until the province comes to the table, or we’re going to carry on with business and still expect the province will come to the table.”
This was too much for councillors Ben Henderson and Tony Caterina, who supported an agreement outline council passed in January but switched to the “no” camp this time to oppose the funding motion.
“If the province comes through with the 55 (million), OK, I’m prepared to get back on the bandwagon at that point,” Caterina said, before the motion passed 8-5. “(However), we’re still looking for millions of dollars. That’s not a plan B.”
Henderson said he’s unhappy $3 million a year in new money is going to the arena when he had told supporters the project won’t affect anything else the city wants to do.
“I think it changes some of the commitments I have made … It’s a line I don’t feel I can cross over.”
But his colleagues insisted it’s time to move ahead on a scheme under discussion for almost seven years, one they see kick-starting downtown revitalization and $2-billion worth of surrounding development.
Most people think the facility has already been approved, Mayor Stephen Mandel said, who decried people playing politics with the issue. “We have spent $9 billion on capital (construction), and other than that we’re fixing up Jasper Avenue and the LRT station … we don’t spend money downtown,” he said. “I don’t know anybody who goes to the suburbs and says ‘Isn’t this lovely?’ ”
Councillors are scheduled to complete approval April 24 of the master agreement with Katz, along with the location agreement keeping the Oilers in Edmonton for at least 35 years and a half-dozen related documents.
While Mandel said they won’t go forward until they have the rest of the provincial money, he couldn’t say whether the deal will be dead if the money doesn’t come through, which could stretch into May.
One obvious source — the Katz Group — indicated it wouldn’t make up the missing $100 million the day after the provincial budget, Farbrother said.