Goldeyes ask city to extend $1-a-year lease for Shaw Park

The Winnipeg Goldeyes and the city are renegotiating the baseball club's $1-a-year lease for Shaw Park amid pressure from some councillors to ensure the rent on the stadium is closer to market value.

In 1997, city council approved a long-term lease agreement for the city-owned stadium originally known as CanWest Global Park.

Goldeyes planning stadium improvements, but some councillors pushing for higher rent

8 years ago

Duration 1:34

The Winnipeg Goldeyes and the city are renegotiating the baseball club's $1-a-year lease for Shaw Park amid pressure from some councillors to ensure the rent on the stadium is closer to market value.

The city leases the stadium land to Riverside Park Management, a non-profit organization controlled by Goldeyes officials. That organization, in turn, sublets the stadium — as well as several nearby parking lots — to the Goldeyes, owned by former mayor Sam Katz and play in the American Association of Professional Baseball.

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With the stadium lease set to expire in 2023, the Goldeyes asked the city for an extension that would allow the club to pay off the cost of building improvements over a longer period.​

"We approached the city two years ago about the lease. We were looking at our long-term facility plans and some of the capital improvements (i.e. scoreboard) would need to be amortized over a longer term (life) than the current lease," Goldeyes chief financial officer Jason McRae-King said in a statement.

The city says the lease negotiations remain underway, but there's no guarantee the stadium rent will remain $1 a year.

"We do have a council-adopted policy for leasing at market value," Winnipeg's chief administrative officer Doug McNeil said. "We should do what's in the best interests of citizens, but also the business deal."

Council property chairman John Orlikow (River Heights-Fort Garry) said the lease renegotiations should take into account both Shaw Park's market value and the economic and cultural value of having the Winnipeg Goldeyes play downtown.

He noted the team brings hundreds of thousands of people downtown every summer, has affordable ticket prices and actually wins championships.

"They do have a benefit to the City of Winnipeg, but it is also a business," Orlikow said. "We do have to deal with [Shaw Park] as an asset and how much that asset is worth for the city and for the proponent."

Any new or renegotiated Shaw Park lease will come before a council committee for approval, McNeil said.

Some councillors are already warning the next lease ought to be more agreeable for the city.

Mynarski Coun. Ross Eadie said while he believes $1 a year made sense in 1997, when the Goldeyes were trying to establish themselves as a viable business, he is opposed to further subsidies for the club.

"We know that it is viable and we should be negotiating an agreement that actually reflects market value and where the property is located," Eadie said in an interview.

"I'm not sure the capital projects that they have are necessary in order for the baseball team to be viable."

St. Charles Coun. Shawn Dobson went further, arguing lease renegotiations should be suspended in the wake of the latest round of RCMP allegations about the Winnipeg police-headquarters project. 

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City officials said the RCMP investigation has no bearing on the Shaw Park lease.