HALIFAX—Sports fans are a bit closer to learning whether Halifax will house a Canadian Football League franchise on the East Coast.

The group trying to bring a team to Nova Scotia’s capital, Schooners Sports and Entertainment, says it’s finally ready to submit its outdoor stadium proposal to Halifax city staff.

The stadium, which would be housed at Dartmouth’s Shannon Park and operate in partnership with Sport Nova Scotia, has been downsized from the original plan several years ago. The reworked “community model approach” is to build just 12,000 permanent grandstand-style seats with the option to add temporary seats to surpass 20,000 for CFL games. The cost for the new model would be roughly $130 million, down from the initial $170- to $190-million price tag.

It’s been almost a year since Halifax council voted unanimously to direct city staff to analyze the business case for the stadium.

In late March, Anthony LeBlanc, one of the owners behind Schooners Sports and Entertainment, told reporters he wanted the group’s proposal submitted by the end of June. That didn’t happen.

Speaking to Star Halifax in late August — days before the Schooners put on a regular-season game between the Toronto Argonauts and Montreal Alouettes in Moncton, N.B. — LeBlanc said they are now crossing their t’s and dotting their i’s. They want the proposal in the hands of city staff by month’s end.

Then, LeBlanc hopes, things will begin moving and he’ll hear sooner rather than later whether the stadium will ever happen.

Here’s what LeBlanc had to say about making the pitch, the negativity that surrounds the stadium idea and whether he’ll have the support of council when a vote takes place.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Do you still believe playing Sunday’s CFL game in Moncton, N.B. was the right move?

Absolutely it’s the right move. We’ve said all along this project of the Schooners is an Atlantic region one. Moncton obviously has a wonderful existing stadium, and the success of the Schooners is going to require fans from Moncton, Fredericton, Saint John, Charlottetown, St. John’s, Sydney, everywhere. It’s all part of our regional strategy that we will be looking at as we turn our focus now back where it needs to be, which is the long-term work that we’re doing in Halifax.

We’ve heard you are ready to deliver your stadium proposal to city staff next month. Is that correct?

Yes, and we’re hoping it doesn’t even creep into September. I was hopeful, being the failed marketing guy, that it would be submitted (last week), before this game. We put as much time as we have into it, and we weren’t going to rush it just for one week though. Where we’re at today, I feel confident maybe by the end of (this week).

You have said previously you wanted this in the hands of city staff by the end of June. What caused the delay?

I tend to be my own worst enemy by putting out these artificial timelines. I think I was under the impression we could get the work done by that time frame.

The good news and the bad news is that what we’re going to submit is going to be a very wholesome package that is a combination of work between ourselves, the Canada Lands company as well as a number of third-party experts that we have retained to work with us on this. That work took a lot longer than any of us expected.

If you read social media, there is a lot of negativity toward how long this process is taking, and people continue to say we can’t afford this stadium. Are you hearing that with the people you talk to? Can you concede there is a negative tone to this situation?

I think when there is a lack of information, and a void is existing, people tend to fill that void with their own hypothesis. So, I don’t disagree there are some negative comments being made, but I think once this is presented and the information starts to be disseminated and put out to the public realm, I think people will be very excited with what we’re doing. I think we’ve been very thoughtful in our approach, especially with the partnership with Sport Nova Scotia.

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Listen, the sentiment we’ve heard is people want a stadium, but they don’t want to go crazy. They don’t want a fancy, multi-hundred-million-dollar facility. They want something that is functional, that works for the community and that would have the potential of hosting a professional team. What we’ve illustrated is we’re definitely listening to what people want, and we’re also working closely with the people at the league office to ensure the work we’re doing with Sport Nova Scotia, and the planning we’re doing, is going to be sufficient for their needs.

I think what will happen is once we’re now going to be back out there with information presented to city staff, people will have an opportunity to review what we’ve submitted and make the decision. We certainly know there are going to be people on one side who want a stadium at any cost, and there are going to be people on the other side. They will not listen to reason and they don’t want a stadium because of the perception it’s taking away from general services, which it most certainly will not. We’ll fight those battles.

Are you releasing publicly what you’re sending to city staff?

I would assume organizations like yours will put in an FOI (Freedom-of-Information) request and I anticipate multiple of those will happen. So I will work with Mr. Dube (Jacques Dube, Halifax CAO) and his staff on the best way for this information to go out.

At the end of the day, you need the support of council. How do you hope to get them on board with this project?

We’ve had the opportunity to meet with council a couple of times in-camera and give them updates on our thought process, albeit it’s been quite some time since we’ve done that. The last time they heard from us with Mr. Dube was back in November.

That said, we keep a pretty open dialogue with members of council. What I can say is when members of council see me, or we run into each other, they are always asking and anticipating seeing the package that we’re ready to submit. So I still think there’s a strong desire on council to give this a real, serious look, and we’ll see if they accept.

Has much changed in this latest proposal from what was announced in March?

Nope. Not at all.

Obviously what we’ve done is we have worked closely on a lot of the logistical aspects, in particular in Shannon Park, of what a stadium looks like in terms of sewers to parking to traffic patterns. What I like to say is the nonsexy stuff, but the very, very required stuff. But the planning, the usage from Sports Nova Scotia’s perspective, nothing has changed.

What has really struck me and really reinforced this plan is getting the opportunity to go to the Halifax Wanderers grounds and seeing a couple of (soccer) games. I’m just blown away with what (Wanderers President) Derek Martin and his team have done. It also shows you that temporary seating can’t last forever. But it certainly is a great way to bring a product to market, prove the business model, de-risk the project for all stakeholders and then really get this thing moving.

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