Fritzel makes public agreements with KU on Rock Chalk Park proposal

Posted by Chad Lawhorn February 19, 2013 at 12:17 p.m.

Fritzel makes public agreements with KU on Rock Chalk Park proposal

Well, that didn't take long.

One day after Mayor Bob Schumm said he wanted to see the agreements between Thomas Fritzel's Bliss Sports and the various KU entities involved in the Rock Chalk Park property, Fritzel has produced them.

Fritzel has provided four sets of agreements to Lawrence City Hall. (He also dropped off a set of copies for me, as well.) I'm just now starting to read them.

The city will be posting the documents to its Web site shortly. I'll provide a link once it does.

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beatnik 3 months ago

well, everybody should have plenty of time to read and understand the documents between now and the commission meeting tonight

cheeseburger 3 months ago

Reminiscent of Pelosi and Obamacare - pass it so we can find out what's in it.

Joe Hyde 3 months ago

Mayor Schumm might take this window of opportunity to request a delay in order to allow a thorough review of these documents by the commissioners of Junction City. I'm sure they'd be happy to help.

KRichards 3 months ago

When will the city actually finish their agreement and exhibits? How can you vote on something when the city's own document is incomplete?

moderationman 3 months ago

The Junction City thing has nothing to do with this. If Fritzel said the sun rises in the east, some of you would object.

Larrytown 3 months ago

You left off the artificial grass, the Varsity House, and the cell phone towers. The combination of all these things certainly raise questions...and rightfully so.

Pepe 3 months ago

I think the Junction City thing is very important. Ultimately, the question facing the city is who are they going into business with and what is the character of that person? Just as you or I would likely not go into business with someone with a shady track record, the city should not do so either. I think a person's prior history of ethical or unethical dealings is the best indication one can get of how they will conduct themselves in future business dealings. Thus, an inquiry into how the Junction City business was handled seems extremely relevant.

Catalano 3 months ago

Wow. Just got my email from the city about the update at 3:19pm (I know it takes a long time to scan everything into a PDF so I'm not complaining to city staff). But, really...3 hours before the CC meeting? Is this stuff even going to be discussed tonight?

patygrl 3 months ago

Will the CC display more courtesy to Mr. Fritzel, and pass the proposal, or to the taxpayers, and delay their decision?

KRichards 3 months ago

After reading the agreement it seem pretty clear why there is a rush job on this. It is structured is such a way that if the city terminates the construction (for instance a new city commission is elected) they will be on the hook for all of RCP/Endowment/Bliss costs to prepare the site and infrastructure costs.

Thus there is no reasonable person that would cancel this project if the city had to fork over in excess of $10 million.

This is beyond disgusting.

lawrenceloser 3 months ago

I would hope that Bliss would pay the difference in my property tax increase or else I will have to sell my house. Thank you Bliss.

streamfortyseven 3 months ago

I'd have to wonder, the way in which this thing is being handled, whether any of the city commissioners have a conflict of interest on this project - they might want to recuse themselves on the vote just in case this winds up in court.

merrill 3 months ago

Here's another scenario that might come back to bite taxpayers in the butt. This one gets built.

There is an equity issue no matter what and this new giant facility will not make that go away.

That still leaves North Lawrence and Southeast Lawrence without a rec center. Both have had a major influx of population and still growing. SE Lawrence does have Prairie Park Nature Center however athletic events cannot be scheduled.

There is an equity issue no matter what and this new giant facility will not make that go away.

WE taxpayers know this field house scenario will cost we taxpayers more than $31 million after all infrastructure is installed etc etc etc. Traffic Lights/water lines etc etc get expensive.

Considering the total cost will be more than 31 million no matter how the picture is painted why not build a neighborhood rec center in NW with 3 gyms, North Lawrence with two gyms, and Southeast Lawrence with 2 gyms ? This is going to come up. Spend an estimated 11 million on each each facility.

Schedule local athletic events according to where most team members reside.

Jumping in a car to drive across town is not practical thinking. Not any longer. 29 cents a gallon polluting gasoline went bye bye bye some time ago. A ton of people in Lawrence do not bring home $60,000 or more in wages such that a lot of the loudest promoters do and some are on a tax dollar payroll.

In fact it seems this 1994 sales tax money was to provide "neighborhood" rec centers. SE Lawrence is going to want a swimming pool one day.