Council votes to restart engagement over new Calgary arena

CALGARY (660 NEWS) – In a near-unanimous vote, Calgary City Council has asked the committee in charge of exploring a new event centre to engage with a partner over the plan.

That means discussions could be re-ignited between the city and the Calgary Flames over a replacement to the Saddledome.

“Council gave the approval to the Event Centre Assessment Committee to move forward with a conversation in engaging a partner,” explained Ward 6 Councillor Jeff Davison, who also sits on the committee.

It follows a presentation last week from the Calgary Municipal Land Corporation that detailed an ambitious plan for the Victoria Park district, including a new event centre embedded within residential and business development for the aging area.

Davison said that presentation is the main difference since the previous negotiations with the NHL club broke down.

“That’s really what we’re looking at this time. It’s not a reaction, it’s a very proactive stance on how do we create something that adds value for every single Calgarian.”

The lone councillor to come up against the plan was Ward 7’s Druh Farrell. She remains skeptical over how balanced a partnership would be with the Flames.

“The city was expected to take the risk and not share in the reward. To me, a partnership means sharing of the risk and the reward. So I haven’t seen indication this will be any different.”

A major concern for Farrell is the price tag and how much more would be added to the city’s debt through such a plan.

“There’s a lot to be excited about with the Victoria Park portion of the Rivers District, the contribution to the public realm. It’s a big ticket item — that contribution to the public realm — and I have yet to see a solution to the funding of it,” said Farrell. “What I’ve been wanting — craving — is to be able to sit down and have a discussion about all these pieces, how they fit together and how can we fund them without taking on a massive amount of debt.”

This is not a full-blown conversation yet, as the vote just means the Event Centre Assessment Committee will now ask the Flames if they want to head back to the discussion table.

“The question is: do we have a partner at the table with us or not?” said Davison. “Once we have that, we can undertake what does a partnership look like, what would a cost structure look like, what would the broad parameters of an event centre look like, and how do we approach that?”

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