The Magic will pay the city of Orlando as much as $12.7M "for Orlando Police Headquarters and a public parking garage to make way" for a $100M entertainment complex, according to Mark Schlueb of the ORLANDO SENTINEL. City officials "caution that terms of the sale are still being negotiated, and some details will change." But the Magic "probably won't pay more than that and could pay less." The city paid "nearly three times that amount for the land where the Amway Center was built just across the street, but that was during the height of the real-estate boom." The Magic deal "carries about the same per-square-foot price as the property the city is buying two blocks west to build a soccer stadium." Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer said that many details "are still being negotiated but that the proposed price tag is 'a pretty fair price.'" The project is "important to Dyer's overall goal of developing a sports-and-entertainment district stretching from the Florida Citrus Bowl to the new Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, and he wants it to be successful." The Magic have "not released a detailed plan for the development," but it "would include the team's corporate headquarters." The project also is expected to "include a hotel and conference center, garage parking, bars, restaurants, retail space and an outdoor festival plaza" (ORLANDO SENTINEL, 8/20).
