By Sheree Stubblefield
As Midtown continues to increase in popularity, more developments have been zoned to the area, the Fairgrounds Redevelopment one of them. The Memphis Sports & Events Complex will be developed on the part of the Fairgrounds where Libertyland used to be.
The primary focus of the redevelopment will be a convention center for sports, primarily youth sports.
Paul A. Young, Director of the City of Memphis Division of Housing and Community Development and Mary Claire Borys, Manager of Strategic Initiatives were featured speakers at the Cooper-Young Business Association annual meeting held at Knifebird on January 14. They spoke about the development and answered questions from the audience.
Young informed the listeners that youth and amateur sports is a $15 billion annual industry and is the only segment of the tourism industry that did not experience a single quarter of decline during the Great Recession, which is why this redevelopment is such a potential boon for the city.
“We are targeting sports like basketball and volleyball, which are popular both locally and nationally, but the facility will be able to host a wide array of sporting events — wrestling, fencing, futsal, pickleball, cheer, gymnastics, etc. — as well as other events like trade shows and school graduations,” Young said. “Our intention is to create a facility that will have tournaments on the weekend attracting players from all over the region and country, while simultaneously providing a class A space for local sports teams to practice and compete during the week.”
Another advantage is that local athletes will also be able to participate in those weekend tournaments and compete against top talent without having to incur the expense of traveling to places like Las Vegas, Texas, and Florida like they do now.
Questions were raised by CYBA members concerning how the project would be funded to which the response was a Tourism Development Zone or TDZ. The way it was explained is that if a city builds a tourist attraction, more people will come to it and the surrounding area and spend money, resulting in an increased amount of sales taxes. Then the City gets to use that increased amount of taxes to pay off the construction debt for the tourist attraction. The baseline sales tax amount is established within the zone before the tourist attraction is developed. The TDZ ends after 30 years or after the construction debt is paid off, whichever comes first.
The City is acting as the master developer of the site and will work with various developers on the different components of the development, such as James Maclin with M&M Enterprises which is working on the planned hotel.
“To be successful, our ‘convention center for sports’ needs to be close to the same amenities any convention center needs – sufficient hotel rooms, restaurants, and retail,” said Young.
The City has designated 18 acres on the northern end of the Fairgrounds campus – along Central Ave between the Maxine Smith STEAM Academy and Children’s Museum – for a mixed-use development of up to 700,000 square feet with a mix of retail, apartments, offices, hotels, and family entertainment. The exact number of units and square footage of each component will be determined as through negotiation with the component developers. It’s important to note that the city will retain ownership of the land and provide long-term ground leases to the component developers who will own the actual buildings. This is similar to the arrangement that the city has with the Memphis College of Art; the city owns the land and the College owns the building, which reverts back to the city under certain conditions.’
For those concerned about the landscape of the redevelopment, Borys put them at ease by saying, “It is our intention to save as many existing trees as possible. New tree plantings, thoughtful landscaping, and pedestrian-friendly paths are a component of the development plans.”
A groundbreaking date has not yet been set.
“We will either start this summer with some of the dirt work and then stop for football season or we will wait until after football season to get started,” said Borys.
Once construction does start, it will take about 16 months to build the Memphis Sports & Events Complex. The mixed-use development will be constructed around the same time, but the different components will be completed at different times; some parts may finish before the Memphis Sports & Events Complex, while others may be finished up to six months after the Sports Complex.
Citizens with questions about the Fairgrounds redevelopment should contact Borys at mary.borys@memphistn.gov or 901-636-7375. There is also a website devoted to the project: memphisfairgrounds.com.
