The City of Charlottetown wasn’t directly involved in negotiations to change the name of its largest sports and entertainment complex but did approve the new name.
Eastlink recently announced a multi-year deal to take over naming rights to the Charlottetown Civic Centre. The entire building, including the trade centre component, will now be known as the Eastlink Centre.
The deal was reached with the Charlottetown Islanders of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, arena management and the board of governors, which has a city representative at the table.
Mayor Clifford Lee said city council agreed in 2003, when the Montreal Rocket moved to Charlottetown, to allow the owners of the team to sell naming rights to the arena.
“That remained on the contract every year since the Q team arrived in Charlottetown and the new owners of the team obviously took it upon themselves to move forward with naming of the building,’’ Lee said.
City council rubber stamped the decision earlier this year.
Lee said the city did have the right to veto any name change. The city owns the arena portion of the building, granting it $720,000 in this year’s budget. That figure does not include extra costs such as renovations or $200,000 to buy equipment, such as a regulation basketball floor for the Island Storm franchise.
The provincial government owns the trade centre portion.
“The city had the right to reject any specific name. If someone came forward with a name that the community would object to (or) if it was deemed to be offensive then the city could step in.’’
Lee said no one objected to Eastlink getting the name.
The arena itself will get a small share of the sale price to cover administration costs, such as changing the letterhead and new uniforms.
“We got a percentage of what they got,’’ said John Abbott, chairman of the Eastlink Centre’s board of governors. “We’re very happy. We’ll certainly put it to good use.’’
The majority of money from the name sale will likely go directly into general revenue for the hockey team. While a group of Charlottetown businessman came up with the $3.5 million to buy the team the annual cost to run the team is close to $2 million.
Abbott said negotiations with Eastlink to change the name began while the Savard family still owned the team.
“They had a few feelers out to some of the larger corporations on P.E.I.,’’ Abbott said, adding that it never really got off the ground.
“When APM named the Cornwall (arena) the APM Centre and then Summerside followed with Credit Union Place and then with Eastlink Arena I think it got a little more serious. They were close to making a deal (in Charlottetown) towards the end of last year.’’
The Islanders’ ownership inherited negotiations and reached a deal with Eastlink for less than what the Savards wanted, according to several sources.
“On behalf of the board, we are excited to be partnered up with Eastlink,’’ Abbott said.
