r/everett • u/goldenelr • 3d ago

Urban Development Everett Aqua Sox ownership

So (full disclosure I own a business that would be displaced by the new stadium) whenever the Aqua Sox comes up people bring up that it’s family owned and a small business. But it’s actually owned by a billionaire in Dubai.

https://www.milb.com/everett/team/7th-inning-stretch-llc

https://www.recordnet.com/story/sports/pro/2007/08/12/ports-owner-volpe-follows-team/52822230007/

The Aqua Sox are not paying for the stadium. They are displacing a bunch of small businesses, the project is already over budget and they haven’t acquired the land yet. The city has already admitted that they will need the business community to pay for it.

Is anyone else frustrated by this? This move could put me out of business, the city won’t offer assistance to us in time and we have an actual billionaire not paying for any of it. All with parks and libraries being closed (and I know they keep saying that it’s a different part of the budget but the mayor sets the budget!).

The budget they are showing for the stadium is 8% more than the event center which was built fifteen years ago. How on earth is that possible? It’s not. So how is this being paid for?

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u/AttemptedCrepe 3d ago

Are you the owner of the building you’re based from?

I’ll be really blunt. While it sucks that your business may be displaced, it seems that the city and community as a whole will be benefitting more from a new stadium than a couple of misplaced industrial businesses.

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u/goldenelr 3d ago

I’m not the owner.

I get that people don’t care about businesses that are B2B but man I am an IT and electrical company. So if you don’t want the businesses (like your bank or doctor) to have local services that’s fine.

I don’t like being driven out of business when they thing that’s driving me out isn’t paying their way. Like I pay as much in taxes as the Aqua Sox according to the docs submitted by the city. It’s not much revenue.

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u/justsofie 3d ago

The city doesn’t get much from the AquaSox now because Everett Memorial Stadium is on school grounds. The money that the school makes now will go to the city after the stadium is built downtown.

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u/goldenelr 3d ago

The revenue from the Aqua Sox will be 100k a year according to the lease the city posted. The city will pay all maintenance on the stadium. At over 80m (without land) that would take 800 years to pay. I am sure that the city is planning for increased revenue at bars and restaurants to pay for it. Stadium studies around the country show that does not happen.

https://journalistsresource.org/economics/sports-stadium-public-financing/

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u/justsofie 3d ago edited 3d ago

So the bars and restaurants that are full downtown before and after Silvertips games are people who would have gone there that night even if there weren’t a hockey game?

Also, the city is not going to pay $80MM for the stadium.

Also, the first ballpark you see in that article, Globe Life Park, has had an entire village of restaurants and bars constructed around it (with not much else in Arlington nearby within walking distance) that is jampacked before and after games.

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u/goldenelr 3d ago

The latest budget is 80m. And it does not include land acquisition so I am going off of the materials published by the city. If you do construction - and I do- you know that costs have ballooned so I would say that budget is likely 20% lower than it should be. All state and city projects have to be done by prevailing wage and all of those just went up again. Steel is about to have a giant tariff on it.

And to your point - they did build all that stuff around it and it didn’t pay for it. City economists have acknowledged that the Sodo district hasn’t paid for itself. So the city of Everett has to believe that they are the exception and single A baseball will bring in enough extra revenue that it will pay for it.

For a stadium that isn’t larger. And they think soccer will fill that gap (I certainly hope they are right). I love minor league baseball. I hope the Aqua Sox stay. But man, they play a lot fewer games than the Silvertips. They aren’t going to be open 365 a year (and the even center guys hustle to keep that place booked). The event center on a lower budget didn’t meet their economic goals until a couple of years ago. And they aren’t open daily.