Hoover council approves $3.4 million for indoor event center
The Hoover City Council this week awarded a nearly $3.4 million contract to Dunn Building Co. to provide a pre-engineered metal building that will be the indoor event center for the planned Hoover Sportsplex next to Hoover Metropolitan Stadium.
Dunn Building Co. was the lowest of five bidders for the contract, but just barely. Dunn’s bid was $3,372,477, while Covenant Steel Warehouse Inc. submitted a 3,379,919 bid — just $7,442 more. The highest bid was from Wyatt General Contractor LLC, at $3,746,990.
Hoover Executive Director Allen Pate said he felt confident that Dunn Building Co. would do a good job because it is a quality company. Dunn built the Hoover Municipal Center many years ago, he said.
The idea is for the 141,000-square-foot indoor facility to be used for sporting events, trade shows, meetings, banquets and graduation ceremonies.
The indoor facility will be able to accommodate a full-size football or soccer field, nine regulation-size basketball courts, 12 regulation-size volleyball courts or six indoor tennis courts, city officials said. It will not be tall enough to accommodate a football game with punting but could handle a 7-on-7 game.
The event center also is slated to include a recreational walking track suspended 14 feet in the air, an athletic training and rehab center, a food court and a covered walkway connecting it to the Hoover Met.
The indoor facility should be able to seat 2,400 for banquets and 5,000 for events with general seating, such as a graduation ceremony or concert, Hoover Mayor Gary Ivey said.
Pate said city officials hope to have the event center in place by May of next year, in time for the 2017 SEC Baseball Tournament, if the city wins the contract to continue hosting the tournament.
Councilman John Greene was the only council member voting against the contract award. Greene also was the only council member who voted against the entire Hoover Sportsplex, estimated to cost a total of $70 million, back in December. He said then that while a sports complex would be an excellent addition to the city, he was not in favor of such a large expenditure because questions remained about whether the city was providing enough money for its school system.
Two other councilmen, John Lyda and Gene Smith, joined Greene in voting against the proposed financial team to handle an estimated $70 million bond issue for the sports complex.
The council voted 4-3 to use Merchant Capital LLC, Raymond James and Piper Jaffray as underwriters for the bond issue and Kipling Jones & Co. as the city’s financial advisor.
Smith said he was concerned about using Kipling Jones & Co. as the city’s financial advisor because it was his understanding that David Hooks, the representative for the company, had not been involved as a financial advisor in a bond deal in Alabama in more than a year and maybe 2 ½ years.
Hooks formerly was head of the Homewood City Council’s Finance Committee. Former Gov. Jim Folsom Jr. appointed him as director of the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs in 1993, and in 2003, Hooks became senior vice president of municipal finance for the Sterne, Agee & Leach investment banking firm. He left Sterne, Agee & Leach in 2010 as managing director of public finance. Jefferson County Commissioner Jimmie Stephens hired Hooks as his chief of staff in 2010, and in 2012, Jefferson County Manager Tony Petelos hired Hooks as the county’s director of capital structure and investments, but Hooks stayed in that job only about five months.
He is now director of innovation for a colloaborative established by the School of Public Health at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Smith said it’s his understanding that Hooks’ financial advisor job is more of a side job for him now and he’s concerned about whether Hooks is fully informed about the current market and will be able to get the city the best bond deal possible.
Lyda said he thinks it’s irresponsible for the city to hire someone who has been out of the business for more than two years to handle its bond issue when there are other capable financial advisors interested in the job.
Hoover’s finance director, Robert Yeager, said Hooks was involved in two bond refinances for the city in 2010 and 2013 and produced good results. Yeager said he was comfortable working with Hooks.
Lyda said he didn’t like the idea of city officials pulling in an old friend for the financial deal when the person has not been active in the market recently.
Monday’s Hoover City Council meeting had an unusual number of split votes — seven. The council votes unanimously on most items.
Other split votes included two 6-1 votes to rezone 273 acres along Interstate 459. The council rezoned about 253 acres from apartment use to commercial use and 20 acres from apartment use to single-family residential use.
Councilman Jack Natter voted against both of those rezoning motions after trying to table the matter for more discussion. See more about those votes here.
The council also voted 6-1 to authorize the mayor to offer $337,940 to the Hoover school board for about 21 acres next to Hoover Metropolitan Stadium that the city wants to use as part of the Hoover Sportsplex and a second entrance to the sports complex off Learning Lane, at the entrance to Hoover High School. Greene was the lone dissenter on that vote.
Greene also was the lone dissenter on a 6-1 vote to give approval for Douglas Hovanec to sell liquor at Revolve Kitchen and Brew in The Village at Lee Branch.
The council previously held off on a vote on the request because Hovanec previously had been convicted of distributing drugs. Police Chief Nick Derzis said he looked into the matter, met with Hovanec and felt comfortable with the council approving the request because Hovanec’s drug conviction was more than 20 years ago and he had not had any more issues with the law since then.
Smith noted that Hovanec already has similar licenses at other businesses within Hoover.
Smith was the lone dissenter in a 6-1 vote to approve a workman’s compensation agreement with Midwest Employers Casualty Co. Before the vote, Smith asked if the council could find out which city employee would receive the payment, and Pate at first told him no. After Smith voted against the measure, Pate supplied Smith with the name.
In other business Monday, the council:
- Approved a utility agreement regarding a 1-mile sidewalk along Chapel Road from Park Avenue to Stone Brook Parkway
- Approved utility and construction agreements regarding 1.4 miles of sidewalks on various streets in the Bluff Park community, including Valley Street, Clearview Road, Savoy Street, Cloudland Drive and Tyler Road
- Approved an agreement with the Alabama Department of Transportation regarding the resurfacing of John Hawkins Parkway between Interstate 459 and U.S. 31.
- Approved special event licenses to sell alcoholic beverages in the parking lot of the Cajun Steamer at 180 Main Street, Suite 200 for the Spring Into Summer Crawfish Boil on April 16 and in the parking lot at 2080 Valleydale Road for the Ragtime Café 25th Anniversary Celebration on April 30.
- Granted a franchise to Level 3 Communications to run fiber-optic cable in the city.
- Set a public hearing for April 18 to consider whether to allow William Beard to operate an event facility with live entertainment for weddings, corporate events and similar functions and to sell alcohol at 2034 Little Valley Road.