Wednesday October 4, 2012
By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Wednesday October 4, 2012
Pan Am stadium: Councillor says city got it wrong
Councillor Lloyd Ferguson thinks Hamilton made the wrong decision about the location of the Pan Am stadium.
In fact, Ferguson — a co-chair of the Pan Am subcommittee along with Councillor Bernie Morelli — thinks the city’s decision to rebuild Ivor Wynne Stadium was so misguided that he tried this summer to convince the Hamilton Tiger-Cats to reconsider the west harbour.
“I’m frustrated. I don’t know what to do. I feel helpless. I think it’s wrong, but I feel helpless. So I’ve decided to open up,” Ferguson said. “What I’m hearing clearly from my community is, ‘You shouldn’t have put it there.’”
However, Ticats president Scott Mitchell says agreeing to move the stadium so late in the game would mean jeopardizing the funding from the other levels of government.
“Any discussion about changing it could have put the total financial burden on the city alone in siting and constructing a stadium,” Mitchell said in an email. “In essence, it would have ceased to have been a Pan Am stadium and that certainly didn’t seem realistic.”
Ferguson’s comments come only days before Infrastructure Ontario (IO), the provincial development agency in charge of the Pan Am Games venues, is set to announce the design of the $150-million stadium. The plans and cost of the new Ivor Wynne will be revealed Friday, Oct. 12 at 2 p.m., said TO2015 spokesperson Carlene Siopis.
Though the location of this announcement hasn’t been confirmed, Siopis said it will not take place during halftime at the Ticats game — a rumour circulating a few weeks ago. (Source: Metro News)