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Prospect Terre Haute Rex

Rex having major impact on Terre Haute

February 24, 2011 - Prospect League (Prospect)
Terre Haute Rex News Release


Terre Haute is a community on the rise.

Improvements to the city, especially those along the Wabash River, helped capture the Indiana chamber of commerce's Community of the Year award in 2010. City leaders believe the Terre Haute Rex played a major role in winning the award and will continue to play a major role as the community continues to improve.

"Anything a city can do to present itself in a better way adds to our portfolio," Terre Haute mayor Duke Bennett said last week. "It's something the community can rally around."

Rod Henry, president of the Terre Haute chamber of commerce, said the economic impact of the Rex on the community has been huge. "Obviously, during the season, it has a major impact because it's something new," Henry said. "When you bring people together, dollars are spent in the community."

Bennett said the most important impact of the Rex is drawing in people from outside of the community. "I made it to part of about half of the games, just to watch and see who was there. I saw people not only from Terre Haute, not only from Vigo County, but from surrounding counties and Illinois," Bennett said. "It's a regional draw. It keeps people traveling to Terre Haute and spending dollars that way."

He added that, even in the team's first offseason, excitement about the Rex can still be found throughout the community. "In the offseason, people are buying Rex gear and talking about it," Bennett said. "They are starting to build that excitement up for another season."

Henry said that bringing baseball back to Terre Haute has had a major impact on the community through publicity for Terre Haute both in the immediate region and throughout the Prospect League. "The more people that are attracted to the baseball stadium, the more the message gets out about having baseball of this caliber in the area," Henry said. "It's something that hasn't been available in this community for years."

The positive publicity impact of the Rex is just as important as the economic impact, Henry said, likening the Rex to when Terre Haute hosted the training camp of the Indianapolis Colts. "You can't put a dollar-and-cents figure on it, but it's huge," Henry said.

Both Bennett and Henry believe that the best way for the Rex to continue to help the Terre Haute community improve is to keep winning. "I'm hoping they'll continue to win a lot of ballgames and the community will continue to support them and keep up the community spirit that we have," Bennett said. "My guess is you'll see more and more business sponsors and support. The sky is the limit to what the future holds there."

Henry said that winning games would allow the Rex to create an experience the fans want to relive again and again. "We want to see attendance improve so much that they have to expand the stadium further," Henry said, alluding to the fact that the Rex added 257 new chairback seats to Bob Warn Field at Sycamore Stadium this winter.

The location of the stadium, on the corner of First and Locust Streets, also plays a role on the impact the team has on the community, putting the Rex near the Wabash River, an area of which the city has been wanting to take advantage. "Because of its proximity, it fit in well with the overall theme of the [effort to beautify the riverfront]," Henry said. "This has been an initiative that has been long desired by the community. It took a collaboration from ISU, the chamber of commerce, the visitors bureau and others."

In addition to the riverfront, the Rex are impacting Terre Haute's downtown. This week, the Indiana State Foundation, which owns the Rex through Sycamore Holdings, will move from Gillum Hall on Sixth Street to a brand new building on the corner of Fifth and Cherry Streets. For the time being, Rex general manager Roland Shelton will have an office in the new building and operations manager Casey DeGroote will continue to work from an office at the baseball field, but the Rex will eventually have a permanent home in the new building, said ISU Foundation president Dr. Gene Crume.

The building will also house several other Indiana State organizations, including the Alumni Association and Sycamore Athletic Foundation, and will soon feature a Barnes and Noble bookstore. "Like the Rex, the new facility provides another opportunity for Terre Haute to showcase its growth and progress," Crume said in an email Monday. "Moving over 40 employees and the business that accompanies them from campus to downtown will help provide additional traffic to downtown. Plus, once Barnes and Noble opens, it will be a prominent destination after 6 p.m., which will generate evening foot traffic."

The Rex are also providing employment opportunities in the community, as illustrated by ISU students and Rex interns Brenna Dick and Matthew Son, who both have aspirations of helping the Rex improve the community even more. "My overall goal and vision for the Rex would be to have the stadium sold out every night," said Dick, a marketing intern. "I want to blow the marketing for this team out of the water so people are excited and keep coming back for more Rex baseball."

Son said he is also excited to make the experience as fun for fans as possible. "In the past, I've gone to games and always wondered how my experience would be, but now it's fun to actually be a part of the planning and process for making the fan experience," Son, a ticketing intern, said. "I hope that when I am out in the Terre Haute community, I hear people talking about how much of a great time they had at a Terre Haute Rex game."

While Henry noted that after a few seasons the newness of the Rex will wear off and it will get harder to draw fans, it seems the entire community supports the team and wants to see it around for the long haul, creating revenue and publicity for Terre Haute.

"I believe that this is a great organization," Dick said. "It adds so much life to the Terre Haute community. It's something the whole family can do, and I think that it is only going to continue to grow in the future."

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The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

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