Hartford, CT
Minor League Baseball Franchise Negotiations and Program Management
In the fall of 1999, the City of Hartford, Connecticut retained the services of Brailsford & Dunlavey to represent the City in its negotiations with a minor league professional baseball franchise, which intended to relocate to a new baseball stadium being developed in Hartford. B&D was charged with negotiating a Memorandum of Understanding with the team to outline the terms of the public-private funding of the stadium and then subsequently with negotiating both a Development Agreement and Lease Agreement for the construction and operation of the ballpark. The baseball club was a franchise of the independent Northern League, but the City required that the ballpark be designed to conform with the standards of the Professional Baseball Agreement for AAA parks in the event that the City had the opportunity to pursue a team affiliated with Major League Baseball in the future.
Based
on the application of a detailed analysis of
"market comparable" lease terms and the unique
demographic and corporate strengths of the
Hartford market, B&D was able to successfully
negotiate a combination of private capital
funding from the team and lease payments whose
combined capitalized value represented twice
that initially offered by the franchise.
Unfortunately, the team ultimately was unable
to assemble its funding commitment, and as a
result the project did not proceed.