As part of Melnyk’s whirlwind media tour this past Wednesday, the Senators owner agreed to appear on the Fan 590’s ‘Prime Time Sports’ program with Bob McCown. Melnyk has long been one of McCown’s favourite guests because of his willingness to be pretty candid with his comments, so let’s just jump right into this.
To listen to the full interview, you can scroll to the bottom where there is an embedded media player.
As always, my thoughts are in bold.
On where this proposal process is at…
“Just to put it in perspective, imagine 63 acres right smack downtown Toronto. That’s huge. That’s like 12 arenas lined up if you were to build it out, but it is huge. It is pretty well smack right on the edge of downtown, so it would be let’s say 57 acres at Spadina and Front. It’s on a proposed LRT, light transit rail, and it’s right there. You can walk from Parliament Hill and you can walk from a lot of places. Where they are now, they’ve put up what’s called an offer for people to make proposals. They cut it down to four people that they thought qualified. You had to submit and we have submitted ours in December. It’s over 2,500 pages and that’s like small type and it would probably take you five days to read this thing and that’s if you read six hours a day. It’s huge. Everybody got their little chapters to write and do and that sort of thing and then we submitted. We now have what are called ‘public consultations’, so that’s two days and evenings where we can talk publicly. Before that, it was all very secretive and you couldn’t say a word. If you did, you got a letter and it’s kind of nasty, but now it’s kind of a free for all. You’ve got the public here last night. They thought it was 800, but it was more like 1,500 people in the War Museum. They’re expecting another 1,500 people tonight. Like, starting in 20 minutes we present and you can hear the whole thing. Just go to the NCC website and you can hear us presenting or I think you can even see it.”
On who owns the land at LeBreton…
“Yeah, it’s federal. It’s Crown land and it’s the last piece of real estate of this magnitude in Canada. The NCC has oversight and their job is to find a way to develop it. We’re one of the two groups that are bidding for it and I think we’re the leaders. At least publicly we are leading heavily. We’ve had close to 15-million people respond positively to ours and I think 150,000 (to theirs). So (public opinion) is like 98-percent our way, but still at the end of the day, things can happen and we’re just hoping for the best.”
… Where did these figures come from?
On the plan being to develop an arena and residential and commercial properties…
“It is and there’s a whole bunch of things that… We’ve got the arena, but that’s only four or five acres, but still, it’s a state of the art (building). And what was huge even 10 or 15 years ago never mind 30, the technologies in arenas now are exponentially greater technologies. State of the art stuff now compared to what it was, like I said, 20 years ago, you just couldn’t believe that this was happening in our area. Everything from big screens to the pixels and the lighting is different, it’s just really special what they can do.”
Shiny new perks are great, but nothing should trump the opportunity to sell more tickets and provide a centralized game-day experience to a larger sect of the Ottawa and Gatineau area probably trumps all. Having grown up in the west end, obviously I feel for those who live in the surrounding areas who don’t work downtown and will be less inclined to renew their season ticket packages. At the same time, especially with LRT being paramount to each respective bid, putting the rink downtown creates an opportunity for the greater good of the franchise. Mix in a bustling hub of restaurants and bars and it completely changes the game-day experience. Plus, we’ll no longer have to listen to entitled shits complain about parking or driving to Kanata. Win!
On why he’s on the record for stating that even if the other group wins the bid, he has no interest in playing in an arena that is owned by them…
“That is correct. We don’t have any interest (in playing in an arena that is owned by them). I’d rather just stay in my arena. You can’t just rent… that’s how you don’t survive. You have to have the whole package of all the other revenue streams and that really subsidizes or almost subsidizes the hockey team because we don’t have the gate Toronto, Montreal or New York does. Nor the merchandise or anything else. We have just that, but it’s in a small/medium market and you need other (revenue streams) to have success.”
And it’s totally understandable for the Senators not to want to lease the rink from the other group, but I wish Ken Reid or McCown asked Melnyk how he felt about the possibility of DCDLS winning the bid and offering to sell the rink to Melnyk. On Wednesday, the vice-president of Candarel and DCDLS group member Daniel Peritz indicated in a separate radio interview that his group would be willing to sell the arena to the Senators if their bid was successful.
It was a cute gesture.
“Oh, you want to continue to own the Ottawa Senators and own a rink downtown? Well, here’s your chance. Pony up the money and it’s yours. Oh, you can’t? Okay, let us buy the team and take it off your hands then.”
If DCDLS wins the bid, it’s hard not to envision a situation in which they leverage their building and cut into Capital Tickets’ market for concerts and events. If they can cut into those revenue streams for the Senators, it could help pave the way for Melnyk being more open to selling the club. Assuming that he’s being true to his word that he won’t sell the team right now.
On condos being part of a bid and whether he was influenced by Toronto or even Lansdowne’s recent development…
“I think the main thing is that we are out in Kanata, so for your listeners if they’ve not been here before, it’s almost like going to Barrie. Well no, not that far. Yeah, a solid 35 minutes (to drive to the arena from downtown) and that’s without the snowstorms. And then to get out, the parking out there… It should never have been (built out there). Everybody kind of says… I bought it 13 years ago, but it was built and opened 25 years ago. And that facility was like 22 years ago and it should never have been build out there, but the guys had the land and they tried it and now everybody’s…. guys like me are paying for it. But, we need a downtown arena and it’s got to be the whole package. And frankly, we have to own (the rink) because we want to be able to… I don’t want to ask permission if I can have… let’s say they say, ‘No animals.’ You know this big craze going on? Did you see this about these puppies that kids are winning from their dads if somebody scores a goal? Bobby Ryan. Now it happened in Columbus. The guy scored a hat trick. They don’t realize that’s gambling now. OLG has got its claws out.”
As others have continuously pointed out, the arena is in Kanata because the Ottawa Senators founders did not have many alternatives. I don’t really feel that Eugene was too hard done by for rescuing the arena and Senators for a $117-million when his investment is now worth an estimated $370-million according to Forbes’ most recent franchise valuation.
On whether it’s a challenge for the Senators to sell tickets in Kanata…
“It’s not easy. You’ve got to buckle down. The way that I’d (handle things) if I did not win (the LeBreton Flats bid) is I would build around that arena a lot more. I’d make it a destination place that you want to hang out there. You might as well get there just after lunchtime and do something. It’s like somebody coming from not Buffalo, but say Niagara Falls to Toronto, you’re not just going to come to the game and go back. You’re going to come in the afternoon, hang around Toronto, ‘Do de do de do,’ eat, drink, shop and then go to the game and then maybe (stay) overnight. That’s what we would have to do in Kanata to make it survive and we’re prepared to do it. Right now, the best thing is downtown.”
“Buckle up Sens fans because we’re buckling down.”
My gut feeling is that the Senators will eventually be at LeBreton Flats irrespective of which group is selected, but it would be interesting to see what Melnyk does in the event that he loses the bid. Having lost out on an MLS team and a prospective casino property near the CTC, he’s already missed out twice. He probably feels he is owed his due, so it would be interesting to see how he’d handle losing for a third time.
On the DCDLS bid having some strong names headlining their group…
“No, no. They are not at the head of it. These guys are like silent names. I mean, they weren’t here yesterday. I’m here. They’re… one guy is in Tahiti. I thought (he was in) New Zealand on business. No, it’s the beach in Tahiti and the other guy is nowhere to be found. They just gave their names (to the proposal). Those names are $25,000… not those guys, but directors get… you know you can get a good name for $25,000 a year.”
And the gloves have come off!
On Andre Desmarais and Guy Laliberte not really having a stake in the LeBreton Bid…
“God knows what they’re (doing). They have not… they didn’t close these guys until weeks before the consultation. They certainly did not have… this whole other group, these guys are all construction guys from Montreal and Gatineau and no no no.”
Maybe it’s just me, but if I’m a Toronto-born Canadian and am no longer covered by OHIP because I’m a citizen of Barbados and spend most of my time living there, I’m probably not going to spend any time portraying the opposition as outsiders or imply that a few guys have lent their names in an effort to denigrate DCDLS’ bid.
Melnyk’s claims could be true, but at least for me, I don’t really care if they are or not. This mudslinging is beneath Melnyk and to me, it comes off as insecurity.
As a citizen of this city, I want LeBreton Flats development to be the best destination that it can be regardless of whether it’s RendezVous or DCDLS. All I want is a developed area that provides ease of access and motivates me to visit it at any time of the year and not just when there is hockey being played. Most importantly, it shouldn’t be publicly subsidized.
Assuming the NCC makes a choice, a decision on one of these two proposals should be based on merit and on aspirations that can be fully realized.
On when the project gets the final go-ahead…
“We’ll know within a couple of months and then you go into a negotiation with (the NCC). By then, it becomes public, but then you’ve got to negotiate a deal with them and that could take six months. There’s a lot of detail and they inspect everything. Our RFP document was 2,500 pages. That is just going to be (the size) of an appendix and you’re going to say, ‘Oh yeah, we’ll build a street. I will do this. I will do that.’ So, everything that we’re selling here ultimately has to do with the arena and an obligation in some cases. What do we think the odds are of them building an arena without a team, right? You know Bob, I was going to get you an investing part in this. Maybe, I could get you a training centre for a Mars mission or something.”
I wish Melnyk wouldn’t cater to the lowest common denominator. If you want public support, explain why your bid is better without having to use fear mongering over the other group building an arena without a tenant. It’s off-putting.