The mayor's proposal to build another stadium for a Major League Soccer expansion team received initial approval Wednesday.
INDIANAPOLIS — Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett said the city is no longer working with the developer of Eleven Park to build a soccer stadium for Indy Eleven on a site in the southwest corner of downtown.
But the mayor's new proposal to build another stadium for an expansion Major League Soccer team received initial approval Wednesday.
The Capital Development Commission considered a new tax district plan to build a professional soccer stadium in Indy.
“Mayor Hogsett's proposal is to build a publicly owned, public soccer-specific stadium in support of a potential application by Major League Soccer to allow the club to expand in Indianapolis,” City Attorney Scott said.・Mr. Chin told the committee.
The original tax district was approved by the City-County Council in December, which approved the Eleven Park mixed-use development, which includes a 20,000-seat soccer stadium built by Keystone Group. Keystone Group owner Ersar Ozdemir is also the owner of the Indy Eleven United Soccer League team.
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But on Wednesday Mr Hogsett said he no longer supported the Eleven Park stadium plan.
“Negotiations regarding Indy Eleven and Park Stadium have been terminated because it does not make fiscal or fiscal sense,” Hogsett said. “And I think Keystone Group, in a quiet moment, will admit that they need more support from the public sector to make their private investments happen. I don't want to put anyone at risk.”
The new taxing district will fund the construction of a soccer-specific stadium on Pearl Street in the southeast corner of downtown. The original tax district for the Eleven Park site is still under consideration. However, only one proposal can be submitted to the State Budget Committee. The deadline for consideration under current state licensing law is June 30th.
Soccer supporters attended Wednesday's committee meeting wearing T-shirts that read “Build Eleven Park.” Mostly football supporters are members of his group “Brickyard Battalion”.
“Anxiety is the right word. Frustration,” said David Ziemba, president of the Brickyard Battalion. “The members have reached out. There's a lot of anger directed at the mayor's office right now because, again, they don't understand and I explain to them what's going on. I'm in a position where I'm trying to figure out what's going on from the mayor's office, and the mayor won't contact me.''
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The committee passed the mayor's new stadium proposal to the city-county council. The resolution is scheduled to be presented to council on May 13th.
City-County Councilor Kristen Jones stood with soccer supporters after the committee meeting. The Eleven Park project is located in her district.
“They want a native PSDA (Professional Sports Development Area), an allocation area, and they respect the commitments that we've already passed,” Jones said. “They want Eleven Park to be built as planned.”
But the mayor's plans have changed.