Hoffman Estates trustee candidates debate productivity of village-owned Now Arena
Four candidates seeking three available Hoffman Estates trustee seats on April 4 are debating whether the Now Arena can be more active and financially lucrative for the village than it has been.
Retired Hoffman Estates police lieutenant and 2021 mayoral candidate Mark Mueller and incumbents Anna Newell, Gary Pilafas and Gary Stanton are vying for the 4-year terms.
Mueller is criticizing the village-owned arena's productivity.
Last week, Now Arena General Manager Ben Gibbs touted 2022 as a financial record-breaker for the 11,000-seat venue and the Hideaway Brew Garden just outside during a presentation before the Hoffman Estates Chamber of Commerce & Industry.
Though the 2022 operating income at the nearly 17-year-old arena exceeded its 2019 earnings by $745,000, Mueller said 43 active dates just isn't enough.
He was keen to separate the success of the Hideaway Brew Garden from the arena's own performance, and pointed out that even a number of its 43 programmed dates weren't traditional entertainment shows or sporting events, but rather graduation ceremonies or Feed My Starving Children volunteering efforts.
Mueller suggested a variety of options, including privatization, be explored to enable a more vigorous future for the arena.
Mueller said his familiarity with the arena's operations comes from having been in charge of the overtime details for the police department.
Newell said the arena has a great manager who's always on the lookout for opportunities there. She added, for the village to have let the venue go dark when its private developer failed would have been detrimental.
"I think the Now Arena is holding its own," she said.
While some events may be meeting more people's needs than others, Newell said a continuous string of activities isn't likely or practical at such a large venue.
Though the arena remains the home of the Chicago Bulls' G League affiliate, the Windy City Bulls, the venue has lost some of its sports teams due to their own financial issues, Stanton said.
The Now Arena seemed in good position to attract the Chicago Wolves, with the professional hockey team already holding its practices in the village, but that offer was trumped by their prior venue at the Allstate Arena, he added.
Despite the fact that the Now Arena doesn't seem to be a favorite of promoter Live Nation Entertainment, it's still doing well with its bookings, Stanton said.
Pilafas, who chairs the village board's finance committee, said Hoffman Estates has done well with the arena considering it wasn't the village's enterprise but that of a developer who was less successful at making it work.
Such an indoor arena, which is on track to be paid off in 2033, isn't really a Monday through Thursday venue and is bound to be less active during summertime, Pilafas said.
Yet, warm weather activity has been captured by the relatively new beer garden outside that hosted 70 live bands and 85,000 guests last year.
The arena also has received a lot of new equipment recently, including a video scoreboard, that makes it more attractive to tenants and guests, Pilafas said.
"It is a complicated entity," he added.
The arena's 15-year naming-rights agreement with Bloomingdale-based Now Health Group Inc. was signed in 2020 for $11.25 million.