Sept. 18, 2004

Charleston, SC - After months of waiting -- to see if a bowl game would come to Charleston, to learn where and when a new football stadium could be built -- The Citadel has decided to take matters into its own hands.

The school's athletic committee will recommend to the Board of Visitors today that The Citadel build its new stadium where Stoney Field currently stands.

The committee also will recommend that if The Citadel does not have the necessary commitments to build a new stadium -- from the city and county of Charleston and from state government -- by Jan. 30, 2005, it will revert to "Plan B," the original plan to renovate aging Johnson Hagood Stadium.

The Board of Visitors is expected to approve the measures at its meeting today.

"What we have decided to do is to grab the reins on this project, to build a stadium at the Stoney Field site," Citadel president Maj. Gen. John S. Grinalds said.

The Citadel also has committed to having a new football stadium by the beginning of the 2006 season, whether it is at Stoney Field or Johnson Hagood, which was built in 1949. The west-side stands at Johnson Hagood were demolished this summer, and the Bulldogs will play in a stadium with temporary bleachers and press box this year and in 2005. "That is the bottom line of this entire process," said William E. Jenkinson III, the chairman of the Board of Visitors. "We are going to play football in a new facility in 2006."

The problem with the Stoney Field site is that The Citadel does not own it. The City of Charleston does, and Citadel officials have been talking with the city officials for months about building a new stadium at Stoney Field, where Burke High School plays its football games.

"That will be our first move," Grinalds said, "to ask the city to grant us that property, so that we can begin the construction. It is entirely possible that with that deed, we can begin building the west stands with the money that we already have raised towards the vision of a 35,000-seat stadium on the Stoney Field site."

Said Jenkinson, "We think Stoney Field is in the best interest of not only The Citadel but of Charleston and the Lowcountry. And the strong message we need to send is that if it is the city's intention to go along with this project, let's move forward smartly."

The saga of a new football stadium at The Citadel dates back to at least the late 1980s, when former athletic director Walt Nadzak had a model of a new stadium made to show prospective donors. In the current chapter of the story, The Citadel had decided to spend about $15 million to renovate 22,000-seat Johnson Hagood Stadium when ESPN and the Charleston Metro Sports Council raised the possibility of playing a bowl game -- the Palmetto Bowl -- in Charleston.

That would have required a 35,000-seat stadium at a cost of about $30 million and, due to concerns of property owners near Johnson Hagood Stadium, a new site. That's when the idea of building at Stoney Field arose. The Citadel took the position that it would contribute its $15 million toward a new stadium, if other partners -- the city, county, state, federal government, a corporation that might purchase naming rights -- came up with the rest.

Trying to put all this together was Tommy McQueeney, chairman of the Sports Council's bowl committee. But in July, the Palmetto Bowl proposal fell apart due to the NCAA's ban on pre-determined events in South Carolina because of the state's stance on the Confederate flag. That removed from the table the $5.7 million the state legislature had committed for stadium expansion, contingent on the bowl game coming to Charleston.

The Citadel had originally set a Sept. 30 deadline for a decision on a stadium site, and effectively pushed that back Friday until next January.

The athletic committee also recommended a stadium project team that will negotiate with governmental authorities, estimate the project cost and take the lead in fund-raising.

The Citadel has raised about $6 million in private donations, about 90 percent of that total from just three individual donors.

Grinalds said three companies have turned down a chance to buy naming rights for a new stadium, but McQueeney remains confident that a name sponsor can be found. Consultant Nick Lomax said naming rights typically bring in about one third of a stadium's total cost -- in this case, perhaps as much as $10 million.

In order to have a new stadium ready for the 2006 season, whether at Stoney Field or Johnson Hagood, construction bids must come in by late winter or early spring of 2005, Jenkinson said.

"What we are saying is that it is our intention to go to Stoney Field," Jenkinson said. "But if the commitments from others are not forthcoming, we will build at Johnson Hagood Stadium."

NOTES

w Citadel officials said it cost $366,770 to tear down the west stands at Johnson Hagood Stadium. The removal of the remains of some 350 people buried under the stadium has been completed.