British Columbia Jobs, Tourism & Innovation Minister Pat Bell Thursday said that the provincial government “won't reimburse Telus for signs the company ordered for BC Place or for the cost of negotiating a now-failed stadium renaming agreement,” according to Lee & Fowlie of the VANCOUVER SUN. But Bell said that the province “will renegotiate an agreement with Telus for an extensive digital technology services package it installed in the Vancouver stadium last year as part of the overall naming plan.” That technology deal, which will “cost taxpayers millions of dollars over its 20-year life, was installed by Telus largely at its own cost" in the expectation its C$40M bid to rename the stadium Telus Park would be accepted. Bell said that B.C. Place operator Pavilion Corp. “had always intended to make the digital upgrades to the stadium and would have engaged Telus as a contractor since it is the prime supplier of that technology in B.C.” But Bell did acknowledge that Pavilion Corp. “wanted to tie the naming rights and technology deal together.” Bell also said that Telus “was not given the okay to have the signs constructed and for that reason" (VANCOUVER SUN, 3/9). Brand management firm Emblematica Principal Tom Mayenknecht said the decision to reject the naming-rights offer by Telus “doesn’t make any financial sense.” Mayenknecht said, “When you look at naming-rights deals throughout North America, it actually competes with the best of them.” Naming rights for Air Canada Centre are worth about C$1.5M annually and Bell Centre about C$800,000 annually (GLOBE & MAIL, 3/9).
BAD DECISION: A VANCOUVER SUN editorial is written under the header, “Nixing BC Place Deal Looks Like A Blunder.” The editorial states the timing of the government's “rejection of a tentative deal for the renaming of BC Place stinks.” It “smells not only of a story that is only being half told, but of the cavalier treatment of B.C.'s largest private-sector employer and one of the biggest investors in the future of this province.” What we “don't know is why the province pulled out.” B.C. Premier Christy Clark said that it “wasn't a good deal for taxpayers.” Bell said that it “was because of sentimental attachment to the old name.” Yet a focus group study “commissioned by PavCo found that British Columbians would be happy to sell the naming rights to BC Place if it would lessen the financial burden on taxpayers” (VANCOUVER SUN, 3/9).
