Jul. 1--Fans, team officials and the mayor are hoping a new lease proposal will keep the Macon Whoopee in town -- but that same proposal may hamper efforts to bring arena football to the midstate.
Early Friday, the city attorney's office completed the tentative agreement between the Whoopee and the city that includes giving the minor league hockey team increased revenues from concessions, parking and ticket sales.
A City Council committee will discuss and vote on the agreement July 11. The entire council will address the matter at its July 18 meeting.
A key provision in the proposal would give team officials the right to sell backlit advertising signs in the Macon Coliseum, splitting the revenues with the city. Space exists for 15-20 permanent signs.
If the council ratifies the agreement, the Whoopee would sell the advertising and install the signs. The team would keep enough proceeds to pay for the signs and the installation. The remainder of the revenues would be split evenly between the Whoopee and the city.
Mayor C. Jack Ellis said negotiations with other sports franchises, including the possible new arena football team, could include a portion of the city's 50 percent of the sign revenues.
But Bryan Watson, president of the organization trying to bring the arena football team to Macon, said if the Whoopee does get exclusive rights to sell the signs, it would spell the end of Sports Towne's effort to bring to Macon.
'I can't operate under those terms,' Watson said. 'We would want to have control of our own indoor advertising. The word 'exclusive' (in the proposal) gives me a bad feeling. I don't understand what gives (the Whoopee) the right to those signs. Is it because they've been here for five years? It's not like the Coliseum already had (the signs). It's just something I'm not willing to live with.'
Ellis said the Whoopee deal and any deal with the league are separate issues. The Whoopee will not receive the same type of deal as the Macon Braves baseball club, and a possible football team would not receive the same deal as the hockey team. Negotiations with the football organization have yet to begin, he said.
'We do look forward to sitting down with (the football club) now that we have a tentative agreement with the Whoopee,' Ellis said.
Even though the Whoopee is set to receive the rights to selling signs, that may change if the team is not up to the task.
The lease agreement has a clause that stipulates the Whoopee must reach gross advertising revenues of $50,000 by the third year of selling the signs. If they do not, they lose the rights to sell the signs.
But that may not be enough to placate Sports Towne. Owner Beverly Olson told Watson on Friday that he was free to start looking at other possible sites for a team if the city wasn't going to offer a more favorable lease. Sports Towne may look at Columbus, where the city government and civic center have made a huge push to join next year, Watson said. Columbus officials have not had a firm ownership group step up.
'This isn't an issue of me being the bad guy,' said Watson, who added that this wasn't an attempt to play hardball with Macon officials.
'We're bringing eight dates (to the Coliseum) that didn't exist before we came. We didn't want to compete with the Whoopee over this. I like the Whoopee. Beverly owns eight season tickets.'
Watson said he wasn't going to start looking into other cities until negotiations are dead here.
'We're going to sit on this until we figure out what is going on,' he said.
But Watson felt the city was changing its tune from earlier discussions he had. Watson said Ellis previously told him that Sports Towne would have a voice over the signage issue, but never said specifically what that voice would be.
'I felt like something was there,' Watson said. 'It concerns me that the mayor has put the priority with the hockey team. ... I'm a little fed up, to be honest.'
Although negotiations are nearing an end, the deal between the city and the Whoopee is not complete.
Members of the City Council have said they favor efforts to keep the Whoopee in Macon. Regardless, they do expect to ask questions about the future of the team.
Councilman Jimmy Patton, for example, has adamantly supported a deal for the Whoopee. But Friday, he said he has seen some discrepancies in the revenue numbers.
A consultant's study released earlier this year said the Whoopee generates nearly $650,000 for the Centreplex. When the mayor's office reworked the numbers, it found less than $100,000 in net revenue for the Centreplex.
'If (the study) is right, we're making a big mistake losing the Whoopee,' Patton said. 'If (the administration) is right, there is little impact to the city if we lose the Whoopee.'
Nonetheless, he said, he would much rather bet on a current customer's ability to turn a profit that to bet on something that might or might not come later -- such as an arena football team.
Watson said the city could opt for rotating signs, benefiting everyone. The Whoopee could sell the advertising during its season and Sports Towne could sell it during the summer.
--By Thomas W. Krause and Phillip Ramati
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(c) 2000, The Macon Telegraph, Ga. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.
