November 11, 2010

Tiger-Cats stadium plan now has hotel, $53m in red ink

After promising an announcement yesterday to provide details of a plan to build a hotel, conference center centre, and townhouses alongside their perpetually planned new stadium, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats owners announced ... that they plan to build a hotel, conference centre, and townhouses. Any other details, if they were supplied, didn't make it into the Canadian media coverage.

In any case, the prime holdup in the Ticats stadium saga remains, which is that $30-million-plus-whatever-the-stadium-land-costs funding gap in the project. Local elected officials, to their credit, seem to be mostly keeping their eyes on the prize:

"Pretty pictures don't excite me anymore," said city councillor Brad Clark. "I need to know where the money is."

Echoed fellow councillor Russ Powers: "Where's the beef?"

And another member of city council, Terry Whitehead, added: "Is it smoke and mirrors?"

Hamilton Mayor-elect Bob Bratina, meanwhile, said he hoped that "excitement" over the development plans announced yesterday would convince either public or private sources to cough up enough money to fill the funding gap, which he estimated at $53 million. And if that doesn't work, maybe the Ticats could pay some Canadians to act excited for them.