EVERETT — A report released last week studying a potential $25 million indoor sports facility in Marysville found the project would likely require public investment to attract a developer.
City staff had previously looked for a private builder to take on the project, Marysville Mayor Jon Nehring said on June 2. Finding a solution isn’t out of the realm of possibility, but the new report represented a “paradigm shift” of how city officials see the project, he said.
The Snohomish County area is in need of indoor courts that community organizations and sports leagues could use, said Norm Gill, a consultant with Kentucky-based firm Pinnacle Indoor Sports at a June 2 council work session. The firm’s report said a new sports facility could attract local and regional visitors taking part in sports tournaments and bring tax revenue to the city and state.
Officials in Snohomish County have been working for years to find a location for an indoor sports facility to host regional tournaments.
In 2019, another consulting firm found there was a lack of indoor sports facilities that contained multiple courts in the area. As a result, many regional sports tournaments take place in the Spokane and Portland areas instead, the consultants wrote.
In 2023, Marysville shared potential plans for a $73 million waterfront center, complete with an indoor sports facility, a hotel, hundreds of apartments and a family entertainment center with go-karts, laser tag and bowling. It would be located on city-owned land along Marysville’s Ebey Waterfront.
The new report from Pinnacle Indoor Sports studied a hypothetical 100,000-square-foot facility on the site with eight regulation-sized basketball courts, with the ability to convert to 16 volleyball courts, to serve as a destination for regional sports tournaments. Right now, the city has not funded a project or approved any plans for a facility.
“This is the preferred site for a county for such a facility, but there is no investor at this point and there is no financing or funding for the facility,” Nehring said at a June 2 meeting. “This is a concept at this point.”
Getting to the point where a facility could be built would require a public-private partnership, the report reads. The financial model of the proposed facility “demonstrates insufficient operational returns to attract full private investment,” it reads.
If it moves forward, options for funding the project may include a direct capital contribution from the city, the report said. But when initially looking at uses for the site, the city had sought to have a private developer come in to build the facility and “never anticipated a heavy governmental investment,” Nehring said.
“We are skeptical whether we can find a private partner and whether this project will be able to go forward,” he wrote in a statement June 3.
The council also raised questions over parking issues and how visitors will spend their money. There aren’t enough hotel rooms in Marysville city limits to accommodate participants and families taking part in a 16-court volleyball tournament, Gill said. During his June 2 presentation, Gill also said Seattle could serve as an attraction for visitors coming to tournaments in Marysville.
“I’m just curious how that’s going to affect our economic gain from this if all we’re doing is helping our surrounding communities, but we’re taking some of the fall,” council member Kelly Richards said.
The facility could be built at half the size to address a local need for sports facilities, but that would reduce possible economic benefits, Gill said.
“Then the allure of the regional tournament is less,” he said.
City staff said there is also interest from companies to build a new hotel at the site, whether or not the indoor sports facility is built. The presence of an indoor sports facility would determine the scale of the hotel project, staff said June 2.
If the project moves forward, next steps could include determining a funding proposal the city could offer a developer and exploring partnerships with operators who have experience with indoor sports facilities, the report read.
Will Geschke: 425-339-3443; william.geschke@heraldnet.com; X: @willgeschke.
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