Hope On The Horizon

October 29, 2020

Scott Olson, President
Tyler Smith, Vice President
Jack L. Armstrong, Secretary
Martesha Brown
Ian K. Linnabary
Rockford Park District Commissioners
Jay Sandine
c/o The Rockford Park District
Webbs Norman Center
401 S. Main Street
Rockford, IL 61101

Re: Save Riverview Ice House & Downtown Sports Tourism

Dear Commissioners,

We write to express our appreciation for the Rockford Park District’s willingness to listen to our concerns and change course regarding the 2020 Action Plan Update as it relates to the Riverview Ice House and Downtown Sports Tourism. This letter follows presentations and discussions that have taken place through the October 13th Park District Board Meeting, a follow-up discussion that members of our coalition had with Park District leadership on October 20th, as well as the convening of the Ice Facilities Stakeholders that occurred on October 21st.

Your decision to prioritize Riverview and keep both Riverview and Carlson open represents an important and powerful step forward. Additionally, your willingness to re-engage the Ice Community and broader community supports the critical collaboration necessary to achieve the goal of restoring and revitalizing Riverview. We understand, moreover, that there remain significant capital investment and operating deficit issues that must be addressed to achieve this goal. To that end, we appreciate the Park District’s willingness to pledge capital funds towards Riverview and we confirm our desire to be a partner to help address capital and operating needs.

The Park District’s new commitment embraces Riverview as a critical asset to our region and the foundation for creating and maintaining world-class ice facilities. The decision represents a recommitment to the values demonstrated when Riverview was first opened in 1976 as a leading investment in the revitalization of Rockford’s downtown. In renewing this commitment, the Park District also is demonstrating a vital commitment to providing both outstanding neighborhood parks AND access, amenities, tourism, and jobs for the central city. This in turn furthers the Park District’s vision of being the best urban park district in the nation.

We know that investing in older, urban areas in a city like Rockford is not easy. Investing in older compact areas with older buildings generally comes with higher costs than newer buildings in less densely populated areas. Over decades, however, we saw that simply following the path of least financial resistance led to divestment in older parts of our community with an associated disparate and negative impact on the people who live within those areas. Thankfully, we have also seen that trend start to reverse over the past fifteen years through new investments in Rockford’s urban core supported by creative financing strategies and partnerships.

RPD leadership's decision to make Riverview its top priority is incredibly gratifying to our grassroots Save Riverview Ice House coalition and our supporters. With this pivot in focus, we can shift our influence and efforts to a new shared mission. We look forward to working in partnership with the RPD and other state and local officials as well as private organizations to help secure the needed funds to support Riverview's eventual restoration to state-of-the-art status. We also wish to join hands with RPD and other stakeholders in a recommitment to serving disadvantaged youth through our ice facilities. We hope Riverview's future programming can be created with that goal in mind. In our view, even a simple restoration of more well-promoted, frequent Public Skating sessions in Riverview's schedule could help achieve this goal.

We also are glad that Park District leadership, our RAVE partners and others stakeholders are coming to realize the strengths we already have downtown - with three sheets of ice, not just two. Making BMO ice more available for the Rockford Hockey and other users gives us tremendous flexibility in a strengthened partnership not only with RAVE but the Chicago Blackhawks.

We have a follow-up meeting that has been scheduled for Nov. 2. As we prepare for that meeting, and the ongoing work for supporting our shared vision, we will look forward to the opportunity to receive and review pertinent capital investment projections and operating costs for both Riverview and Carlson.

Again, the Save Riverview Ice House coalition wishes to applaud the Rockford Park District for its pivot and recommitment to what we fervently believe is the business, governmental, cultural and ice sports heart of the entire Rockford Region.

Respectfully,

Jay Graham
Peter and Heather Provenzano
Larry Morrissey