Comcast-Spectacor Chair Ed Snider is donating approximately $6.5M to renovate and enclose three outdoor ice rinks in the Philadelphia metropolitan area, which will enable the rinks to operate year round. The city of Philadelphia is matching Snider’s donation with a $6.5M grant from the Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program. “With the economy tanking, the rinks have not been kept up very well, a few are dilapidated,” Snider said. “They will be refurbished and remodeled and we will end up with spectacular modern rinks.”
Snider founded the Ed Snider Youth Hockey Foundation in '05, and the foundation currently pays the operating costs of the Scanlon Ice Rink, Laura Sims Skatehouse and Rink and Simons Recreation and Teen Access Center in Philadelphia. The charity provides free skating and hockey instruction, as well as an amateur hockey league. It works with more than 2,500 youth in the Philadelphia region, and covers the cost for rink time, hockey equipment and coach salaries. Snider said his goal is to work with 10,000 children. “For every dollar donated (to the charity) I donate two,” Snider said.
