MLS Real Salt Lake

Water park could be soccer stadium's new neighbor

December 10, 2008 - Major League Soccer (MLS)
Real Salt Lake News Release


On Tuesday, Sandy City Council gave its OK to plans to offer a developer up to $15 million in tax incentives for building such a project on 6.5 acres Real Salt Lake owns to the north of its stadium at 9256 S. State Street.

The developer -- whose name has not been released -- has presented Sandy with a feasibility that concluded two, 125-room hotels, a 40,000-square-foot indoor water park and 15,000 square feet of retail and restaurants could be successful on the site, a former Ardell Brown RV center.

"Could we build more hotels [in Sandy]? The answer is yes," said the city's Economic Development Director Randy Sant. He also cited hotel statistics that showed, despite the economic slowdown, occupancy rates in the southern Salt Lake Valley have dropped only 3 percent from last year to 68 percent.

Sant insisted "all of the private financing" for the roughly $75 million project would have to be in place before Sandy would "throw one dollar into the pot."

The city's Redevelopment Agency would use the existing Community Development Area around the stadium to channel new property taxes hatched by the hotel/ water park development into the project. Already, Sandy has used the CDA to bond for a $10 million property-tax incentive that went to RSL's $110 million stadium.

With the new project, the city would not bond for the total amount up front, but would instead reimburse the developer, year by year, as property taxes came in, Sant said.

The up to $15 million incentive would cover infrastructure, as much as $1.5 million of the land purchase and a parking terrace. A parking structure would help RSL meet a condition of its public funding package: an additional 1,000 parking stalls within a five-minute walk of the stadium in the next two years.

City Councilman Chris McCandless praised the project as a mechanism for bringing new jobs to Sandy.

"We have a significant downturn in the economy, and I think creating jobs in the community is of the highest importance."

Although Sant would not release the name of the developer, he did disclose that international architectural firm Rosetti, which designed the soccer stadium, has been retained for early design work. Renderings show a pedestrian plaza connecting the two hotels with the stadium.

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Major League Soccer Stories from December 10, 2008


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