The owner of a Harrisburg, Pa. minor league soccer team is looking to raise $14 million for a new stadium on City Island in Pennsylvania's capital.
Eric Pettis, speaking at a March 20 press conference with Mayor Eric Papenfuse and the Dauphin County commissioners at City Hall, said he is looking at public and private funds - including naming rights -- as well as matching grants for the Harrisburg City Islanders, a USL Pro affiliate of the Philadelphia Union of Major League Soccer.
The team wants the new field ready by 2016. Papenfuse said it would "provide a wonderful new recreational facility for the entire region."
The city, which just embarked on a financial recovery plan aimed at avoiding bankruptcy, will not be involved with the financing process, although according to Pettis, the stadium could generate as much as $191,000 annually in amusement taxes for the city.
Plans are to upgrade the current facility on City Island, which sits in the middle of the Susquehanna River just north of the Harrisburg Senators minor-league baseball park, to one with more than 4,500 seats. It would create an entrance plaza, a new concession area, locker rooms, restroom facilities and a new scoreboard for use as a soccer field, youth development center and concert arena.
A feasibility study by Delta Development Inc., for which Dauphin County paid, estimates a new stadium would result in nearly $4 million in spending annually. According to the study, it would generate state and local tax revenue of more than $1 million during the construction of the facility and $910,000 each year-over five times that of the current facility.
