The Inspector Clousseau of College Hockey Journalism falls out of a tree and
lands on his feet...
 
I was finally able to track down someone who could provide the _Lowell Sun_
article about the new UML rink that I babbled about several days ago.  I just
got the FAX, so here goes...
 
(Reprinted without permission)
Manager: City can afford $15M to fund new arena
By John Novack
Sun Staff
 
LOWELL- City Manager Richard Johnson, armed with a financial analysis, says
the city can afford to borrow up to $15 million to help pay for the $45 million
sports-entertainment complex.
 
The city can assume the new debt partly because the ongoing repayments on the
$131 million public school construction project will drop steadily starting in
the year 2002, Johnson said in a 10-year projection of the city's debt service.
 
Also, the manager said an arena will increase downtown retail operations, the
tourism industry and the links between the downtown and the college community.
 
John is hoping that replacing generalized promises by city and buisness leaders
with hard numbers will win over critics who say the city simply cannot afford
the arena.  Still, Lowell buisnessman John Zagarella is pressing his case to
get an advisory question on the November election ballot asking if voters want
the city to borrow $15 million for the project.
 
The UMass Board of Trustees are asking that city officials decide by May 1
whether to support the project, since the university had agreed to delay its
original plans to build a smaller on-campus arena to allow Lowell to
investigate a joint enterprise for a larger facility.
 
The City Council is expected to vote on a resolution to authorize Johnson to
proceed with the project.  The manager urged the City Council's Economic
Development and Downtown Subcommittee last night to back the resolution.  He
said it would prompt state Rep. John Cox, D-Lowell, to file legislation that
would set the framework for the project -- a 6,000-to-8,000 seat arena for the
city and University of Massachusetts at Lowell, a practice ice rink and a
student recreational center.
 
Plans unveiled in February call for UMass-Lowell, the state, and the city to
contribute a maximum of $15 million each to the project.
 
Johnson urged councilors to move quickly, since Cox hopes to include the
request for a $15 million grant in the state budget, which will be debated
in coming weeks on Beacon Hill.  But Cox, Johnson said, needs some concrete
commitment from City Hall, like a resolution.
 
Cox plans to file two bills, one asking for the funding, the other to create
an arena authority to oversee the project.
 
Proponents say the complex could open within two years.  The arena and practice
rink would be located off the downtown, near Post Office Square, while the
recreational facility would be on the North Campus near Aiken Avenue.
 
Johnson's financial analysis showed that repaying the arena debt over the next
decade would cost a low of $600,000 and a high, in fiscal year 1997, of
$1,680,000.  The annual cost would slide down in the following years toward
$1.3 million.
 
The projected combined debt service -- the arena costs, plus the borrowing
already assumed by the city -- would range between $6 million and nearly $9.6
million a year.
 
Currently, the city spends about $8 million a year to pay down its capital
debt.  The city already is planning to bond $50 million over the next 18
months, mostly for the ongoing public school replacement project.
 
Councilors debated the city's current finances, its future borrowing
commitments, and the future of the city itself during the two-hour meeting
at City Hall.  Matthew Donahue, chairman of the council subcommittee, turned
the question of affordability on its ear by asking the impact on the city if
it opts out of the project: "What happens to the city if we do nothing?"
 
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