City council approves changes to Calgary Events Centre deal, project to move forward in 2022
Calgary’s events centre project is moving forward after a pause since April due to cost overruns and design concerns.
The events centre is now pegged to cost $608.5 million, up from the $550 million originally laid out in the previous deal signed in 2019.In an effort to cover the funding gap, a clause in the previous agreement was triggered that forced both the city and CSEC to each put an additional $12.5 million into the project to bring the total contribution to $575 million.
Council voted on the budget framework to cap the city’s contribution at $287.5 million, but there will be more costs incurred by the city off the arena site. With costs from the previous agreement, like the $12.4 million to demolish the Saddledome and $3 million in remediation costs, the total contribution for the city now sits at $312.9 million.“Now is not the time to walk back on our commitments. Now is the time to stick to our guns as we lead a massive recovery, one that we have been staging here in Calgary for many months together,” Ward 6 city councillor and mayoral candidate Jeff Davison said.
Ward 3 city councillor and mayoral candidate Jyoti Gondek originally voted in favour of the arena deal in 2019, but voted against all seven recommendations in front of council on Wednesday. A development application for the events centre is expected to be submitted by Aug. 3, as project officials said the plan has shovels in the ground by early 2022.Tickets for non-sporting events and concerts in the new events centre will include an increased fee.
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