Mayor Levar Stoney announces a request for proposals to redevelop the area of the Richmond Coliseum. (Photo by Sarah King)
Mayor Levar Stoney’s plan for downtown redevelopment — which includes replacing the Richmond Coliseum, building a Convention Center hotel and repurposing the historic Blues Armory building — has much in common with an ongoing effort by a group of private investors backed by Dominion Energy CEO Tom Farrell and Altria Group CEO Marty Barrington.
Jeff Kelley, a spokesman for the investors who have been pursuing a similar plan separate from the city, said by email Friday that Farrell and Barrington have “long been exploring options for the area and finding a solution to replace the Coliseum,” and were involved in helping a private group of investors explore options for the same, roughly 10-block area outlined in the request for proposals (RFP) that Stoney announced Thursday.
That area — stretching from North Fifth and 10th streets to East Leigh and Marshall streets – has been identified as an “economic opportunity area” in the GRTC Pulse Corridor Plan, which the Richmond City Council recently adopted into the City Master Plan.
A replacement GRTC transfer station is also included in the city’s call for developer proposals, as well as mixed-income and affordable housing and local employment opportunities in collaboration with the Minority Business Enterprise.
“[The project is] an opportunity to help transform a major part of our city by putting underutilized and underperforming assets to work to field economic opportunity for our residents and improve their quality of life,” Stoney said during a news conference announcing the RFP.
The 46-year-old Coliseum seats about 13,000 and costs taxpayers about $1 million annually. The RFP outlines a structure seating upward of 17,000, and expects respondents to assume the existing $2.9 million in debt.
In September, Richmond BizSense reported that Kelley confirmed the involvement of Fairfax-based Concord Eastridge and Los Angeles-based Future Cities, as master developers for the project.
“No proposal was ever submitted to the city,” Kelley said Friday. “As the mayor noted yesterday, he is certainly aware of the private plan, but this development is a city-led project and Mayor Stoney has laid out a bold vision for downtown.”
Kelley said his group looks forward to reviewing the RFP, and “to a competitive process that moves the city forward.” Jim Nolan, Stoney's press secretary, reiterated that Thursday’s announcement is a city-issued RFP that is not related to any other proposal.
In response to a question about financing options, city officials said by email, “We want proposals to be bold and creative in their responses and to demonstrate how they will provide private financing, but in the end, the city has laid the ground rules for financing solutions that it will NOT consider.”
The response, relayed by Nolan, also states that “there remain many financing tools that any potential respondent could use,” such as tax increment financing, which allows revenue from property value appreciation to offset debt incurred for redevelopment. “The final financing package will depend on what is being proposed and the resources recommended by the respondents.”
The financing parameters seem ambitious for a single entity to take on – as noted in the three-volume “Arena Market Validation and Financial Feasibility Study,” published in 2011. The study was conducted by consultants Barrett Sports group, LLC, Populous Architects, P.C. and Weston Sports & Entertainment – who were commissioned by “The Coliseum Study Group,” which comprised entities including Dominion, Altria, Genworth and MeadWestvaco (now Westrock).
The 2011 study states that any effort to implement a new arena would ultimately need to include regional and corporate partners to be feasible. During the 2016 General Assembly session, recently unseated state Del. Manoli Loupassi introduced legislation granting the Richmond Metropolitan Transit Authority power to acquire land for, construct, own and operate arenas in the region.
Online records show an affiliate registered the website domain www.dominionenergyarena.com on Feb. 6 – the same day the company announced plans to rebrand from Dominion Resources to Dominion Energy. Dominion spokesperson Le-Ha Anderson said the domain name registration was simply part of the company’s rebranding efforts.
“To protect our brand, we purchased domain names that we may be able to use in the future,” Anderson says. “It is purely a coincidence that the name you referenced was purchased as part of our effort to protect and possibly expand our brand in the future.”
In an interview with Richmond BizSense in July, Loupassi said he was prompted to pen the legislation – eventually signed into law by Gov. Terry McAuliffe – after a person of “very credible means and ability” approached him and said “this is something they were working on because they wanted to find out the feasibility and what the numbers would look like.”
Facilities management group SMG currently holds the contract on the Coliseum through 2018. SMG also manages the city-subsidized Dominion Arts Center and Altria Theater. The RFP outlines deadline dates through spring 2018. Contract negotiations and City Council approval will take place between April and September 2018.
“The mayor reads the newspaper,” Nolan says via email. “He was obviously aware of the interest in this area for redevelopment, not just locally, but nationally. Which is exactly why the mayor chose to drive a city-led competitive process to solicit proposals, rather than accepting noncompetitive, unsolicited offers.”
