Pricey pre-season: Readying old stadium won’t cost $1M, club says, but it’s a big job

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 02/03/2012 (5204 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Winnipeg Football Club has a lengthy to-do list — ranging from repairing the aging plumbing system to testing the concrete foundation to hooking up the Jumbotron — before it can get Canad Inns Stadium ready for one last Blue Bomber pre-season game.

But Jim Bell, the CFL club’s chief financial officer, insisted Thursday the hit to the pocketbook won’t come close to the $1-million figure a source says is required to get the building up to snuff.

“No, it will not be anywhere close to that,” Bell said from Toronto, refusing to get into specific dollar amounts or any speculation on what the price tag would be. “This is purely operational. Yes, there is a possibility the numbers could go up, but we’re not anticipating any significant costs.

“This is something we’ve had to do every year. It just so happens that we have to do it one more time.”

Earlier this week, a club source indicated the organization could be looking at up to a $1-million price tag to reopen the 59-year-old facility for the June 20 pre-season game against the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. That dollar amount was based on the poor condition of the facility structure and the absence of major capital upgrades prior to last season, as the club figured it would be moving into Investors Group Field for the start of the 2012 schedule.

Due to construction delays at the $190-million Investors Group Field, the Bombers are forced to play at least one more game in the same building to which they officially said goodbye last fall. Winnipeg is scheduled to open the regular-season home schedule July 26 against the Edmonton Eskimos.

The Bombers anticipate that game will be played at the new 33,500-seat facility, though a final decision for that contest won’t be made until May.

The price of returning to Canad Inns Stadium has been recently included in the 2012 operating budget. Bell indicated the club wouldn’t release the total cost until the 2012 annual report comes out in 2013, but did add a disclaimer to his low, unknown monetary projection for reopening the old stadium: Costs for staging the aging facility are subject to revision once the club begins examining the various areas of the building in early April.

“Once we get in there and start the process, we’ll have a better idea of what we’re up against,” he said. “Hopefully, everything will be in good shape.”

The first thing maintenance and stadium operations crews tackle is the deteriorating plumbing system, where pipes need be installed and tested, Bell said. Given the system’s age, this could take a lot of time and is at the top of the maintenance list, he added.

Various concessions around the stadium need to be fully equipped with full plumbing, as do the the visitors’ locker-room and press box. Plus, the washrooms — famous for their Third World feel — require some serious maintenance attention.

“Our washrooms are well-documented in terms of how awful they are, but we still have to make sure they are in working condition,” Bell said.

Also at the top of the list: the structural integrity of the building.

Crews will examine the building with engineers to make sure the facility is safe for a football game. This could see a big cost, Bell worries, as concrete concerns under the grandstands or any cracked asphalt automatically need to be addressed.

“That would be unfortunate because we’re going to be there for such a short period of time,” he added. “But safety is the issue and we’ll have to fix it up. We’ll keep our fingers crossed. Last year, we caught a huge break. There wasn’t something major that we had had to address. If that’s the case again, we can do this for one more game and be very efficient.”

Other areas of Canad Inns Stadium subject to inspection and possible repair include: the electrical system; the Jumbotron and scoreboard; the public address and audio components; all seats, stairs and railings; housekeeping and pest control; the parking lot and the playing field.

“All that stuff has to be working at a level for a professional football game,” Bell said.

The club stands to miss out on as much as $182,000 in ticket revenue for each home game the Bombers play at the old stadium this season instead of the new Investors Group Field in Fort Garry, suggest City of Winnipeg budget data.

adam.wazny@freepress.mb.ca

Blue looking GREEN

TO help take some of the sting out of moving back into Canad Inns Stadium for one more game, the Bombers are expecting some good news next week.

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The club is waiting on 2011 audited financial statements and chief operating officer Jim Bell said the club anticipates close to a $2-million profit.

“We’re definitely going to be in that vicinity,” Bell said.

The club’s previous high-profit mark (in non-Grey Cup host years) was $761,000 in 2008. The Bombers blew that number out of the water last season, thanks to seven regular-season sellouts, winning a sold-out home playoff game and earning a Grey Cup appearance.

When the Bombers eventually move into their new digs at Investors Group Field, new revenue streams such as suites and stadium club seating will be available to them. Bell said the bottom line to the success in 2011 was winning and figures the same will apply at the club’s new home on the University of Manitoba campus.

“On and off the field, that gives us a tremendous backbone heading into the new stadium,” he added. “If we can do as well as we did in that old building, with all due respect to it, we should be in a good (financial) position at Investors Group Field.”