Sports Craze

REVIEW SUMMARY
What. Sports as economic development.
Issue. Local governments and private investors are throwing big bucks at sports projects.
Impact. Sports facilities that lure tourists can lead to future economic development.

Olympic trials and NCAA championships could be held at new swimming and rowing facilities proposed for the Gulf Coast within a few years.

That's the hope of sports enthusiasts, economic development officials, tourism promoters, and local governments looking to boost business and tax revenues.

And a few Olympic champions.

“I can assure you the Olympic team will be here just as soon as we're up and running,” pledged U.S. Olympic rowing champion Jason “J.R.” Read to Sarasota County commissioners during a July 14 standing room only hearing. Read was part of the 2004 U.S. Olympic rowing team that won a gold medal in Athens, and a member of the 2008 team.

Following a parade of other rowing glitterati — including Harvard varsity rowing coach Harry Parker — plus neighborhood group leaders and economic development and tourism advocates, the commission unanimously approved the Nathan Benderson Park Master Plan. Construction costs are expected to approach $30 million.

Down the road in Fort Myers, another Olympic champion, swimmer Rowdy Gaines, is part of a group looking to build “the nation's premier aquatic center,” as described on the developer's Web site. It's hoped to become a swimming and diving venue suitable for Olympic trials and collegiate championships.

“We want to be Swim USA,” says Jeff Mielke, executive director of the Lee County Sports Authority, whose office is in City of Palms Park. “That's really our goal with this. We want to be the dominant swimming community in the United States.”

Gaines is a board member of the National Swimming Center Corp., a non-profit sports development corporation based in Austin, Texas, currently in negotiations with Lee County and the city of Fort Myers. Mielke says Gaines plans to move to Fort Myers to run a swimming program at the facility if the deal gets done.

County and Fort Myers officials are mulling over the deal after it shifted from Cape Coral when that city and NSCC failed to come to terms, in part due to site issues.

Other new sports facilities on the drawing boards across the Gulf Coast look to further expand a growing part of the region's economy. (Click here for a complete list.)

A proposed $12 million, 26-acre softball complex in west Pasco County morphed into 40 acres, and now a possible 80-acre multi-sports complex at a new site. New plans call for five to six baseball/softball fields, three multi-purpose turf fields, a football field, a multi-purpose field house, plus restaurant and office space. The sports complex would be operated and maintained by Sportsplex USA.

Funded largely by tourist taxes, it's now planned to be built on the Starkey Ranch property in Odessa and take 28 months to complete.

Like nothing else

The same day Lee County signed its letter of intent, the Manatee County Commission approved $65,000 in incentives for IMG Academies. The world's largest multi-sport training facility, it's based in southwest Bradenton.

Sports performance is a targeted industry for the county, and part of the Manatee County Economic Development Corporation's five-year strategy.

IMG plans to add 65 employees in the next five years to expand its seven-sports program by adding the Madden Football Academy and a Lacrosse Academy. Plans call for a 50,000-square-foot dormitory in 2012, and $25 million in capital investments on the campus by 2015.

All that growth at IMG doesn't appear to be enough to scare away competition, even in its own backyard. In southeast Manatee, a 110,000-square-foot fitness center and sports academy complex for 14 sports is on the drawing board.

The $110 million Springbok Sports Club and Academy at Lakewood Ranch is planned for 100 acres at the east end of University Parkway. The project is a partnership of Corvus International, Iowa Sports Management and Johan Kriek Tennis.

A 2009 site plan shows facilities including golf, tennis, soccer, swimming, rowing, baseball, softball and even snowboarding, polo and broadcasting. It's been delayed while financing gets arranged.

According to a May posting by Timothy Morris, CEO of Springbok Partners, Inc., on the Springboksportsusa Web site, “ ... the scope and quality of what we are going to be creating at Springbok on a national and international basis will be like nothing the world has ever seen.”

Other sports-related facilities are in the works in the area too. Sarasota County is re-building Ed Smith Stadium for Baltimore Orioles spring training, a $31.2 million project. That price tag includes renovation of Twin Lakes Park, the site of the Orioles minor league facility in east Sarasota.

Twin Lakes is also the site of a proposed Cal Ripken Youth Baseball Academy — the nebulous nugget the Orioles tossed on the table to entice county officials to fund the stadium and Twin Lakes improvements.

According to Jeff Maultsby, Sarasota County's manager for business and economic development, there's no word yet from Cal Ripken or the Orioles on that project moving forward.

In Naples, an investor group pursuing the Chicago Cubs has withdrawn its offer, at least for now. It appears to be a long shot to woo the team from Mesa, Arizona, which according to the Arizona Republic newspaper, considers the Cubs its top tourist attraction. This month, Mesa officials announced a new financing plan for an $84 million complex.

Bang for the buck

Construction of the swim center in Fort Myers would happen only after the Boston Red Sox move to a new $75 million spring training facility off Daniels Parkway east of I-75.

But it's the swimming and rowing complexes that may prove to offer the biggest bang for the bucks and have cash registers ringing year-round.

Local officials, including Lee County Commissioner Ray Judah, showed enough interest to travel to Los Angeles to meet with NSCC officials and attended a swimming foundation fundraiser.

But Judah, a big baseball fan who led the effort to keep the Red Sox, might be just as happy if the county can find a third major league baseball team to make the downtown ballpark its home base. The Minnesota Twins play spring games at Hammond Stadium in south Fort Myers.

The new swim center features two 50-meter pools (one indoor, one outdoor), a fully sanctioned diving well, a 25-yard warm-up pool, and another narrow pool for the Rowdy Gaines Swimming Academy. Plans call for converting City of Palms Park by December 2012.

According to the Sports Authority's Mielke, the key to the deal for local officials is for NSCC to convince them that the corporation can come up with the multi-millions to retrofit the ballpark.

The public contribution for the swim center would be the $30-million stadium, according to John McIlhargy, executive director of the National Swimming Center Corp.

McIlhargy's group would get a 99-year lease for $1 a year, make a $32 million investment to retrofit the stadium and grounds for indoor and outdoor pools, and operate the complex. The parties are halfway through a 120-day due diligence period to see if the deal is doable.

As is the case for the swim center, the Sarasota rowing facility has been several years in the works. The plan for the 600-acre park — a former borrow pit — features a proposed world-class rowing facility that has already held high school and collegiate rowing championships on its1,500-meter course.

Four events this year have brought in 30,392 attendees, and 3,162 room nights with an estimated economic impact of more than $4.5 million. Philip Porter, a University of South Florida economics professor, estimates a potential economic impact of the completed facility at $25.5 million annually.

The plan calls for extending the course to two kilometers to make it suitable to NCAA championship and Olympic caliber events. If a funding plan is worked out, the proposed improvements, possibly done in three phases, will cost nearly $30 million.

Supporters say it will be money well spent because not only is there a $25.5 million economic impact, it will be self-sustaining financially and not the typical taxpayer burden.

Although Pasco's Sportsplex might pale in comparison to the glitz of the swimming and rowing facilities and the funding figures being tossed around, it's still viewed as a catalyst for economic growth.

Pasco County Commissioner Ann Hildebrand, whose district is the location of the Sportsplex, expresses the sentiment of her commissioner colleagues in Manatee, Sarasota and Lee. She says sports facilities serve the twin purposes of economic development goals and being tourist attractions.

“The Sportsplex we hope will attract out of town tourist people when tournaments are held there,” Hildebrand says. “Florida is a prime place for these events to be held because of our climate. When you have all these different teams coming here, they will look at all these economic opportunities.”

if you go

The Economic Development Corporation of Sarasota County will host an event on the impact of sports on economic development Wednesday, Aug. 11, at Sarasota Yacht Club, 7:45 - 9 a.m.

The moderator is Sarasota County Commissioner Joe Barbetta.

Panelists include:'¨Maggie Mitchell, Club Manager, Sarasota Polo Club; Paul Blackketter, Project Manager for Benderson Development and the Rowing Facility at Benderson Park; Michael Treubert, Commissioner, City of North Port; Jason Puckett, Sports Manager, Sarasota County Convention and Visitors Bureau; Susan Kuhlman, CFO, U.S. Masters Swimming; and Pat Calhoon, Sarasota Area Sports Authority.