Worcester Business Journal

April 27, 2020

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wbjournal.com | April 27, 2020 | Worcester Business Journal 9 A Revolutionary partnership between employers, educators and workforce boards, geared towards making Massachusetts the epicenter of Americas manufacturing. TRAINING FOR TOMORROW Powering Today's Industrial Revolution remakema.com Here for you. Here for our community. We're your neighbor and we're here for you. Please reach out to your local UniBank branch, visit unibank.com, or call us at 800.578.4270. As your local community bank, we know we play a vital role in the livelihood of many individuals, families, and businesses. Member FDIC/Member DIF We are stronger together. to the cost of a project already grown from $101 million to $132 million this year, which makes it the second-most expensive minor league baseball stadium ever built, aer (adjusted for inflation) the $150-million Las Vegas Aviators stadium, which opened in 2019. "All that will be a cost-benefit analysis once we understand how much time we have to make up," Augustus said. Under the agreement with the PawSox, the team is responsible for any overruns to the construction costs. How- ever, Augustus said because the global coronavirus pandemic was so unexpect- ed, the city would work with the team about how any extra costs get paid for. An option, he said, includes refinancing the debt obligations on the project, since interest rates have gone down since the coronavirus pandemic started. In deciding what extra costs the city is willing to take on, Augustus said the project's expense has always been weighed against the city's ability to pay for the debt service with revenues generated from the site, including taxes from the surrounding $125-million ho- tel-and-retail development, parking fees, and city-run events at the stadium. "at is still the North Star for us," Augustus said. "We wouldn't want to do anything contrary to the notion that this project pays for itself." Prior to the shutdown, WBJ had in- dependent economists twice review the Listen to the Worcester City Manager Edward Augustus' entire interview on the WBJ podcast episode, Coronavirus' impact on the WooSox stadium, on WBJournal.com. The Weekly Business Report is a joint effort between WBJ and Radio Worcester. All episodes are available on the WBJ website, and new ones publish on Monday mornings. city's pay-for-itself financing plans, and they found it was unlikely this would be the case. In the podcast interview, Augustus discussed alternative options for the team if the construction project misses its deadline, more detail about the impact on the project cost, and how the surrounding $125-million hotel-and-re- tail development from Boston developer Denis Dowdle would be affected by the coronavirus shutdown. e podcast is available on WBJournal.com. W

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