CSU governors OK study of football stadium options

FORT COLLINS – More receptive to the idea of building an on-campus football stadium than were the majority of students, faculty and community members whose testimony they heard for more than two hours on Thursday, the Colorado State University Board of Governors unanimously voted to allow CSU President Tony Frank time to have staff members examine ways to either build the new facility or renovate 46-year-old Hughes Stadium.

Over the next two months, Frank said, he would have campus and community committees study the options and even issue a public “blue book” of pro-and-con arguments similar to the one sent to Colorado voters in advance of an election that lists arguments for and against various statewide ballot issues. “As soon as we put the blue book out,” Frank said, “it will become a catalyst for debate on the numbers – and that’s a good thing.”

He said he also would make a website available for public comments, but while acknowledging that “I have some level of comfort with chaos,” he added, “I’m a big believer in representative forms of government rather than decisions by popular vote.

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“I’ll come back in late November and make public what I am going to recommend to you” at the governors’ next meeting, set for Dec. 4-5, he told the board.

The resolution unanimously adopted by the governors authorized Frank to devote staff time and resources to explore four options:

— paying for maintenance at Hughes,

— substantial modernization of Hughes with the idea that the team would remain there for nearly four more decades,

— a pared-down new stadium at the proposed on-campus site using funds already raised while deferring extras until more money becomes available,

— and rebidding the existing on-campus stadium plan as a public-private partnership.

In their discussion after the public comment period, the governors seemed swayed by Frank’s contention that a new stadium on campus could host many more events than just football games, whereas Hughes could only be used to its full capacity “about six times a year.” The desire for a multiple-use facility was written into the resolution that board chairwoman Dorothy Horrell had drafted and the governors approved.

Frank, who originally intended for the new stadium to be privately financed, was forced to offer the options after conceding that fundraising for the on-campus stadium, which has stirred bitter divisions on the campus and the surrounding community, had fallen far short of its target.

After Frank’s presentation, a parade of speakers – five in favor of the on-campus stadium and 19 opposed to it – spent two minutes apiece at the microphone to express often-impassioned pleas to the governors.

Among the opponents was a parent who noted that “I do not send my son here so that he can attend football games.”

A 96-year-old former industrial chemist, citing the current debate of the spate of concussions among football players, said “We’re supposed to be building brains here, and those brains are in big danger on a football field.”

A current student blasted the university’s “audacity” for producing posters asking him for a $10 donation for the new stadium when he’s already $22,000 in debt to the school.”

Another student said he learned in an ethics class at CSU that “reasonable people can suffer ethical blindness when context overcomes reason.”

CSU economics professor Hal Cochrane bluntly stated, “The college wouldn’t be here without students, and the students are against it.”

The group Save Our Stadium Hughes was represented by Doug Brobst, who questioned why Hughes Stadium was “being treated like the unfavored stepchild.” Bob Vangermeersh proposed that Hughes could be improved to contain a family-friendly, alcohol-free “RamFam” section, shelters with firepits in the tailgating area that would be paid for with donations, a net-zero focus including electric-car charging stations and development of a fitness corridor to connect the stadium to the campus.

Citing Frank’s contention that the Hughes options would have to be paid for through the school’s general fund, Vangermeersh recalled that assistant athletic director for facilities Doug Max had called Hughes “the jewel of the Rockies” in 2006, “but now they’re calling it a piece of (excrement). Who’s going to belly up and pay for that when that’s what they’re hearing?”

But other speakers praised the idea of the new stadium. One had attended the Rams’ recent football game at Boston College and praised the “vibrant” campus atmosphere.

Another noted that CSU athletics could “take that next step” into big-time athletics, maybe being able to join the Pac-12 or Big 12 conferences.

A student who said he was maintaining a 3.93 grade-point average at CSU said athletics provided the “real-world experiences” that are crucial parts of educating college students to enter the workforce.

Tyler Shannon, who co-chairs the pro-stadium Be Bold CSU group, said “I think it’s pretty obvious Tony Frank is pretty committed to the on-campus stadium, and obviously the donors agree. We want CSU to keep focusing on excellence through athletics.”

Shannon, who couldn’t attend the hearing but read media reports while en route home from a business trip, said he looks at the two on-campus options differently. “I’m looking forward to hearing more about the public-private partnership,” he said. “I’m sort of a ‘get it right the first time’ kind of guy, and this way we’d know what the construction costs are. With doing it in phases, maybe 10 years from now those costs would go up and we wouldn’t get the complete plan done.”

In the governors’ discussion that followed, voting member Dimitri E. “Rico” Munn noted that “the ‘blue book’ type of approach is going to take a lot of work, but there are a lot of Ph.Ds in a three-block radius here.”

Citing some stadium opponents’ arguments, Munn charged that a conflict between athletics and academics on campus is “an elitist idea,” and that although impacts of a new stadium in Fort Collins’ core needed to be studied, “we have to evaluate not just what’s good for Fort Collins but the benefit to the state.”

Citing several surveys that showed a majority of students and Fort Collins residents alike opposed the on-campus stadium, one governor noted that there had been large-scale opposition to construction of Denver International Airport when it was being built in the 1990s, but that polls taken then and today would be totally different. They stressed the value of student-athletes and of a stadium that could serve multiple uses, and reaffirmed the land-grant school’s right to do with its property what it chooses.

“It’s obviously the consensus of this board that athletics is part of the academic experience,” Horrell said. “But how can we be the most responsible we can be when it comes to the cost?”

But voting member Dennis Flores noted that “I don’t know who to believe” because “I’m being bombarded with statistics. Every time we’ve had public comment, I hear different figures.”

Board treasurer Joseph Zimlich urged special attention to risks involved in the business models.

When the dust finally settles, Zimlich and Horrell agreed, a big job of the governors will be to heal the sharp rifts the on-campus stadium proposal has created.

“How can whatever comes of this be part of rebuilding our connection with the community, the ‘town-gown’ relationship?” Horrell said.

“It’s extremely divisive,” Zimlich said. “It’s within families. It’s within mine. It will take a major effort to pull this community back together.”