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The pitch for a Halifax stadium took a turn last week when the group proposing the CFL franchise dropped the cost by $50 million, presumably to soften opposition and sweeten the government’s appetite for the project.

The latest plan is to drop some “bells and whistles” to reduce the estimated cost to $120-$140 million. Original estimates were in the $170-$190-million range.

This would be the starter-stadium scenario. There are still many missing details, but this new proposal is moving things in the right direction if the proponents want to garner public support.

The new proposal calls for a functional stadium that would replace some of the upper seats with benches and add general admission areas for 4,000. It would retain the 24,000-seat capacity as originally proposed.

It would be a staged build, with plans to finish construction at some point in the future.

The idea is to reduce the costs of developing and financing the facility and then allow the business model to prove itself before moving on with further development. This was the model used to develop the BMO Stadium where the CFL Argonauts play in Toronto.

Anthony LeBlanc, who is spearheading the proposal for the stadium and the Halifax Schooners football team, says the group can build the stadium for a fixed price of $130 million and that any cost overruns would be absorbed by the developer.

This will be welcome news to politicians and taxpayers who already support the stadium or are still on the fence.

The staged-down approach is an important acknowledgement from developers that the group has heard the opposition and concern over using public money to build the facility, which would be located in Shannon Park on the Dartmouth waterfront.

It remains to be seen whether this will soften opposition from taxpayers who do not want any public money invested. Changing hearts and minds that have already been made up will be an uphill battle.

But the idea does have its supporters beyond CFL fans. Sport Nova Scotia has said many sports and teams could make use of the stadium for practice and events when it isn’t being used for football.

Neither HRM Mayor Mike Savage nor Premier Stephen McNeil have committed any public money to the project on behalf of their respective jurisdictions, and nor should they while a business plan is still forthcoming.

We will await further details to see if there is a devil lurking in them.

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