City, RoughRiders sign new deal through 2014; mayor likes the idea of selling the city's Ice Arena to the team

CEDAR RAPIDS - The City Council this week signed off on a new five-year agreement with the owner of the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders hockey team, and Mayor Ron Corbett singled out one feature of the agreement he liked best - the option to sell the city's 10-year-old Ice Arena to the hockey team.

“I think that's a pretty good idea,” Corbett said at this week's regular council meeting.

Patrick DePalma, chairman of the city's Five Seasons Facilities Commission, said the commission and the team owner, Newco Riders LLC, “are continuing those discussion.”

Newco Riders is a six-member ownership group that includes RoughRiders head coach/general manager Mark Carlson and his wife. The group purchased the club a year ago from a group of Chicago businessmen.

The new agreement between the city and Newco Riders also provides the option for the team to lease the entire Ice Arena, which has a second sheet of ice for figure skating.

The agreement comes with revenue concessions from the city, which will mean $105,000 less for the city's arena operation in the current budget year than the city's budget had anticipated.

At the same time, the team has agreed to make $500,000 in upgrades to the city's arena, most of which have been completed, Scott Schoenike, who heads up the city's entertainment venues, said.

The agreement is retroactive to June 1, 2009, so only four years are left on it.

According to city figures, the team paid an annual rent of $169,404 in the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2009. This fiscal year, the rent dropped to $97,200, and in each of the next four years the annual rent will be $70,000.

In addition, the agreement provides for an option to renew the lease for five additional years. Annual rent will increase over the second five-year period to $86,803 in the last of the five option years.

Both Mayor Ron Corbett and council member Monica Vernon complimented DePalma for hammering out the deal with the hockey team.

“It didn't look like it was going to come together,” the mayor said, recalling meetings earlier this year.

Vernon said both the hockey team and the Kernels minor-league baseball team help provide “momentum” to attract people to the city.