ST. PAUL - The St. Paul Jr. B Canadiens are taking on a few projects to improve the overall experience at home games held at the Clancy Richard Arena.
On June. 22, the club's president, Rick Austin, attended the Town of St. Paul's online regular council meeting, presenting information on three specific ideas the club hopes to move forward with.
The first request is a $31,500 project that would see the creation of a lounge area at the Clancy Richard Arena. The club is looking for permission from the Town of St. Paul, since the municipality owns the arena, to move forward with phase one of the project.
The first phase includes a 60-foot wide window being built, overlooking the ice. Phase two involves the demolition of the north side of the current bar area. Rebuilding the north, east and west walls in the area, installing doors in the bar area, ceiling work, floor work, paint and electrical work.
Phase three includes more finishing work, the installation of televisions, counter tops, and buying new tables and chairs for the space.
The Junior B hockey club will be paying for the renovations and will ensure all work is done, according to buiding codes. Austin noted that there will be advertising opportunities inside the lounge area for local businesses, and any funds raised would be split according to the club's agreement that is already in place with the municipality.
In exchange for investing money into the project, Austin said the club is asking for a 15 per cent discount on ice rentals for the next 10 years, which works out to about $3,000 a season.
When asked about the club's timeline, Austin said he would like to get the project started in July. But, he acknolwedged it would be hard to get everything done in time for the next season, if it starts are usual. That's why the project has been broken up into three phases.
Coun. Gary Ward asked why the lounge area includes doors, to which Austin replied the doors create an opportunity to rent out the space, but they do add to the cost of the project.
CAO Kim Heyman said the municipality would have a building inspector look at the space before giving the club permission to move ahead with the project.
Banners
A second project that the Jr. B club is wanting to move forward with is the installation of 17 banners at center ice in the arena.
There are currently 10 banners hanging in the arena. Austin explained that with permission from the town, all the banners would be remade to be double-sided, and seven new ones would be added. Rather than hanging the banners at the far end of the arena, they would hang in the middle and would be visible from either side of the bleachers.
There would be no financial implications for the town. A motion to approve the installation of the banners was carried.
Advertising
The third initiative presented by Austin on Monday night was permission to sell advertising on the outside of the Clancy Richard Arena.
Advertising would be sold according to five-year contracts, with the town getting 25 per cent of the income, after expenses. The signs would be standard black metal signs.
In a sketch presented to town council, the town logo was shown as an example.
"I think the Town of St. Paul should be up there," said Austin, adding, putting the town's logo up would depend on how many businesses would be interested in paying for advertising on the building. Austin acknolwedged that it could be tough selling advertising amid the current pandemic.
A motion to direct both the lounge request and building advertising request to administration was carried.
