It’s a proposal with plenty of potential leaps and dodges ahead of it, but St. Paul may be getting a four-field, publicly operated “Regional Sports Center” for soccer, rugby, lacrosse and other field sports.
Gov. Tim Walz recommended $329,000 for planning as part of the state bonding proposal released this month. The site plan, according to the proposal, would include athletic fields, parking, access roads and other particulars.
“The purpose of these regional centers is to increase sports participation, as well as promote sports tourism and economic benefit,” reads the proposal from the governor’s office.
Clare Cloyd, a spokeswoman for St. Paul Parks and Recreation, said the city has not settled on a particular location or even fully defined the types of sports and amenities, details that would have to be worked out if the proposal survives the legislative session.
“I think it would be fair to say at this point we would be open to explore either the renovation and upgrading of existing fields and facilities, or the potential addition of new fields or facilities,” Cloyd said. “But it’s early,” she added. “We’ll need to work with (Minnesota Amateur Sports Commission) to understand the best direction forward.”
LACK OF AMATEUR SPORTS FACILITIES
Todd Johnson, executive director of the MASC, said the city of St. Paul will largely steer the details, but state leaders as far back as Gov. Rudy Perpich in the late 1980s have remarked on the lack of high-quality amateur sports facilities in the east metro, he said.
The commission may be best known for its flagship facility — the National Sports Center in Blaine, the largest amateur sports campus in the world. It’s also played a major hand in launching 11 other athletic sites around the state, from a volleyball center in Rochester to a ski jump on Mount Itasca in Coleraine.
In the east metro, however, public dollars have tended to flow instead to university facilities, modest parks and rec centers or professional sports stadiums such as the Xcel Energy Center, CHS Field and Allianz Field.
Several years ago, a city-driven effort to install a tennis center in St. Paul fell by the wayside.
“They’ve been trying to get something on the east side of the Twin Cities … and it’s never happened,” Johnson said.
Johnson said that’s a missed opportunity. Promoting tourism is one of the charges of his organization, which draws some 4 million visitors a year to its 600-acre campus in Blaine.
In 2017, a Wall Street Journal analysis described youth sports as a $19 billion industry, poised to swell to $40 million in a few years time.
“It’s an inflation-proof economic development tool,” Johnson said. “With my boys, even when times are tough, you still figure out a way for them to play hockey or play baseball.”
PIECING TOGETHER PLAYING TIME
St. Paul hasn’t hosted a professional lacrosse team since the Minnesota Swarm, which played at the Xcel Energy Center from 2004 to 2015.
Nevertheless, with competition for lacrosse, rugby and soccer field space at a premium, youth and amateur leagues tend to piece together practice and scrimmage schedules when and where they can, from public parks to mid-sized gyms and even church facilities.
“In the winter months we look for any indoor space available,” said Paul Fannin, president of the St. Paul Jazz Pigs Rugby Football Club, a men’s team that has operated in the city since 1974.
“Currently there are no rugby pitches in St. Paul,” Fannin said. “We have always been and will continue to be a St. Paul-based team, but for now, we have to look outside of the city of St. Paul for field space.”
The Jazz Pigs host outdoor practices twice a week at Afton Heights Park in Maplewood, with practices moved to the Como Park Picnic Pavilion in St. Paul when the ground is too wet.
By late fall, practices shift to Hazelwood Park, which offers lights after sundown. Winter practices head indoors at various locations, most recently Hope Church in Oakdale.
The St. Paul Lacrosse Association splits its time between Brompton Field, near Minnesota 280 and Como Avenue, as well as McMurray Field south of Como Park on Jessamine Avenue and the Cretin-Derham Hall High School field on Albert Street.
The University of Minnesota lacrosse teams often play at the U’s Students Recreational Sports Field dome, located in an industrial area along 25th Avenue SE in Minneapolis near Dinkytown.
The U men’s team also hosts games at Braemer Field in Edina and the Plymouth Creek Fieldhouse in Plymouth.
Other high school and college lacrosse teams practice at Concordia University’s Sea Foam Stadium on St. Paul’s Hamline Avenue, the Savage Sports Center in Savage, the Eastern Carver County Athletic Center in Chaska and the indoor turf at the Anytime Fitness in Edina, among other sites.
The Minnesota Loons, a youth program, use a lacrosse-specific indoor facility on Terrace Drive near Snelling Avenue in Roseville.
MINNEAPOLIS, ROSEVILLE CENTERS HOST NATIONAL TOURNAMENTS
Working hand-in-hand with the municipal entities that operate them, MASC has developed regional, multi-sport centers in Rochester, Marshall, Blaine, St. Cloud and Biwabik.
To get facilities and amateur sports programs like the James Metzen Mighty Ducks off the ground, the commission generally attempts to find private partners who will match state funds.
The public dollars are justified, in part, through economics: regional and out-of-state visitors are drawn to major meets and matches, even World Cups.
“We do like (these projects) to have a regional impact — people come in, stay at a hotel, that sort of thing,” Johnson said
Located near McNamara Alumni Center on University Avenue in Minneapolis, the MASC Jean K. Freeman Aquatic Center is operated by the University of Minnesota and has hosted several of the top swimming and diving events in the country, including Big Ten, NCAA and high school championships.
Just across the river from St. Paul, MASC played a key role in the late 1990s in the development of the Minneapolis Sports Center at the YWCA on Lake Street, which spans a large indoor fieldhouse for track, basketball and recreational walking. Measuring 50,000 square feet, the facility — which received $4 million in state funding — is the largest indoor sports center in the Twin Cities..
Operated by the city of Roseville, the Guidant John Rose Minnesota OVAL hosts the world’s largest outdoor refrigerated ice sheet, featuring 110,000 square feet of ice.
According to MASC, the OVAL ice has supported as many as 1,200 skaters at once, as well as regional, national and World Cup speed-skating events.
