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A lengthy timeout seems to have been called on substantive progress to push the Canadian Football League dream for Halifax into the endzone.

“We’re waiting for the proponents to come back with an actual proposal and as soon as we get a proposal, we’ll start working on our analysis,” Jacques Dube, the chief executive officer of Halifax Regional Municipality, said Tuesday.

The principal owners for the proposed Atlantic Schooners team — Anthony LeBlanc, Bruce Bowser and Gary Drummond — plan to purchase a six- to eight-hectare plot of land in Dartmouth’s Shannon Park from Canada Lands, the Crown corporation tasked with managing and redeveloping surplus military properties. The ownership group, soon to be renamed Atlantic Schooners Football Club, have proposed a 24,000-seat stadium at a cost in the range of $170 million to $190 million on the Shannon Park site.

Halifax regional council addressed the stadium proposal at a meeting in late October, endorsing a motion to have Dube and staff conduct a detailed business-case analysis. The Dube team is to evaluate the need for a stadium, the costs and benefits and partnership opportunities, before bringing its analysis back to council along with a recommendation on whether or not to proceed with the project.

CFL in Halifax

The staff analysis was originally set to take six months but Dube has indicated the six-month clock won’t start ticking until the ownership group delivers its proposal.

“I am coming into Halifax Tuesday night,” LeBlanc said. “Our plan is to deliver all of the numbers to Mr. Dube on Wednesday or Thursday of next week.”

LeBlanc had hoped that council could have a look at his group’s plan and Dube’s analysis by next April.

“It will take six months, once we get a formal proposal with a site plan and a building schedule and what the site would actually include in terms of massing, like height and square footage and all that,” Dube said. “Then, we are in a position that we can start looking at the service impacts and figuring out what our service costs are and looking at the TIF model, the tax increment financing model, and looking at whether it and perhaps a car rental tax and a dedicated portion of the hotel (room) levy could actually cover the debt financing. There is a lot of work to be done so six months is actually quite an ambitious target once you get an application in.”

The municipality’s financial contribution would come from a public financing plan used as a subsidy for redevelopment, infrastructure and debt financing. A TIF district that would encompass some of the entire 35-hectare Shannon Park area would reallocate funds from property taxes on area developments to pay the stadium’s debt charges, estimated to be $9 million to $10 million annually, and to encourage investment within the district.

Dube said allowing the municipality to use the TIF model and changes to car rentals and hotel room levies would require three provincial legislative changes, which will take time.

Dube said his team needs to understand the site plan, the points of entry and exit, and what the road network, parking and public spaces will look like.

LeBlanc said the ownership group will need some “form of finality in 2019” to try to get a building built in time for the 2021 season. A stadium would probably take two years to build and LeBlanc said if its opening date slipped to 2022, it wouldn’t be the end of the world.

“One of the thnigs that we are working on quite aggressively now is with the City of Moncton regarding the concept of playing possibly as early as 2020, having the Schooners kick off in Moncton and what we are talking about is that it might be two years that we have to play in Moncton,” LeBlanc said. “This is an Atlantic team.”

Meanwhile, it appears that the ownership group’s goal of playing in the big league has turned at least one head. Singer-songwriter and multiple Juno Award winner Tom Cochrane, a longtime friend of Bowser, has confirmed his intention to invest in the team.

LeBlanc said the push to align major sponsors has been launched and the team, while working on a logo design, will soon be selling Atlantic Schooners word-marked merchandise on its website and in Halifax.

A lengthy timeout seems to have been called on substantive progress to push the Canadian Football League dream for Halifax into the endzone.

“We’re waiting for the poponents to come back with an actual proposal and as soon as we get a proposal, we’ll start working on our analysis,” Jacques Dube, the chief executive officer of Halifax Regional Municipality, said Tuesday.

The principal owners for the proposed Atlantic Schooners team — Anthony LeBlanc, Bruce Bowser and Gary Drummond — plan to purchase a six- to eight-hectare plot of land in Dartmouth’s Shannon Park from Canada Lands, the Crown corporation tasked with managing and redeveloping surplus military properties. The ownership group, soon to be renamed Atlantic Schooners Football Club, have proposed a 24,000-seat stadium at a cost in the range of $170 million to $190 million on the Shannon Park site.

Halifax regional council addressed the stadium proposal at a meeting in late October, endorsing a motion to have Dube and staff conduct a detailed business-case analysis. The Dube team is to evaluate the need for a stadium, the costs and benefits and partnership opportunities, before bringing its analysis back to council along with a recommendation on whether or not to proceed with the project.

The staff analysis was originally set to take six months but Dube has indicated the six-month clock won’t start ticking until the ownership group delivers its proposal.

“I am coming into Halifax Tuesday night,” LeBlanc said. “Our plan is to deliver all of the numbers to Mr. Dube on Wednesday or Thursday of next week.”

LeBlanc had hoped that council could have a look at his group’s plan and Dube’s analysis by next April.

“It will take six months, once we get a formal proposal with a site plan and a building schedule and what the site would actually include in terms of massing, like height and square footage and all that,” Dube said. “Then, we are in a position that we can start looking at the service impacts and figuring out what our service costs are and looking at the TIF model, the tax increment financing model, and looking at whether it and perhaps a car rental tax and a dedicated portion of the hotel (room) levy could actually cover the debt financing. There is a lot of work to be done so six months is actually quite an ambitious target once you get an application in.”

The municipality’s financial contribution would come from a public financing plan used as a subsidy for redevelopment, infrastructure and debt financing. A TIF district that would encompass some of the entire 35-hectare Shannon Park area would reallocate funds from property taxes on area developments to pay the stadium’s debt charges, estimated to be $9 million to $10 million annually, and to encourage investment within the district.

Dube said allowing the municipality to use the TIF model and changes to car rentals and hotel room levies would require three provincial legislative changes, which will take time.

Dube said his team needs to understand the site plan, the points of entry and exit, and what the road network, parking and public spaces will look like.

LeBlanc said the ownership group will need some “form of finality in 2019” to try to get a building built in time for the 2021 season. A stadium would probably take two years to build and LeBlanc said if its opening date slipped to 2022, it wouldn’t be the end of the world.

“One of the thnigs that we are working on quite aggressively now is with the City of Moncton regarding the concept of playing possibly as early as 2020, having the Schooners kick off in Moncton and what we are talking about is that it might be two years that we have to play in Moncton,” LeBlanc said. “This is an Atlantic team.”

Meanwhile, it appears that the ownership group’s goal of playing in the big league has turned at least one head. Singer-songwriter and multiple Juno Award winner Tom Cochrane, a longtime friend of Bowser, has confirmed his intention to invest in the team.

LeBlanc said the push to align major sponsors has been launched and the team, while working on a logo design, will soon be selling Atlantic Schooners word-marked merchandise on its website and in Halifax.