JANESVILLE As the Woodmans Sports & Convention Center turns 1 year old, the city is working to adjust an agreement that now allows the spaces third-party management firm, Sports Facilities Management, to sell beer at ice hockey games and other events.
Any changes to that agreement await further review by the Janesville City Council after one council member, Heather Miller, asked for the agreement to be tabled until mid-October. She said that would give the council time to digest a 41-page agreement with proposed changes to user fees that would save Sports Facilities Management money.
Through a proposed extension to the agreement the city made last year, the would alter what it charges Sports Facilities Management as a user fee. Previously, the city charged the firm $2,700 each month to allow the company to collect revenue from alcohol sales at the city-owned Woodmans Center during Janesville Jets Hockey games and other events.
The city seeks to lower the bar on that agreement, with a three-year alcohol management contract extension that would decrease the monthly fee to $2,500.
The arrangement would save the Woodmans Centers management company $2,400 per year in fees.
The city did not give estimates of of what Sports Facilities Management earns from a gross or net perspective in alcohol sales.
The contract extension and proposed changes come at the same time as the city faces pressure from the Janesville Jets ownership for changes in the Jets contract at the Woodmans Center including the Jets request for a bigger share in beer sales proceeds than the city gave the team in a contract written last year.
The Jets have held three home games this year, with attendance at those games hovering between 450 and 500 people, the Woodmans Center reports, but the Jets reports its games during last season on average drew more than 900 attendees.
The city created an unusual arrangement that has allowed Sports Facilities Management to operate beer sales through a class B license at the Woodmans Center, though the facility itself is owned by the City. That allowed a private agent to run alcohol sales so the municipality could avoid being directly involved.