Editorial: City's investment in new Houck Field will pay dividends

A drone shot of Houck Stadium in 2022 as construction continues.

Aaron Eisenhauer ~ B Magazine

Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge. Academic Hall. The Mighty Mississippi.

Picture Cape Girardeau, and those iconic images come to mind.

Another will soon join that group, thanks in no small part to an investment by the city's municipal government.

At their meeting Monday, May 15, city council members spoke with one voice as they committed $10.2 million from future casino revenue to construct a multipurpose facility on the campus of Southeast Missouri State University. Per the city's casino funding policy, first drafted in 2012 and updated Monday, officials can only spend casino revenue on certain types of projects, and the project to reimagine Houck Field certainly meets the criteria.

Dating to 1930, the stadium served the university and community well for decades, but it outlived its usefulness, and officials closed the south grandstand in September 2021 after inspections revealed the facility to be unsafe. University officials had been preparing for such an eventuality, and soon thereafter, a plan emerged to deconstruct the stadium and build a new facility.

This new facility will do more than replace the football/soccer stadium. It will include academic and athletic spaces and amenities for fans. Also, the project will be handicapped accessible, which Houck Field was not.

"When we talk about the Houck Project, we aren't just talking about the stadium," Carlos Vargas, president of Southeast Missouri State University, has said. "It is a multiuse complex that will include a facility with classrooms, labs and offices to support STEM, health, life, and allied health sciences research, and academic programs."

Such a complex will come with a significant price tag -- estimated at $60 million. Southeast Missouri State University Foundation has committed $12 million, and the state has allocated $11 million, with potentially $18 million more coming in the next fiscal year budget.

As Vargas noted at Monday's meeting, the city's pledge (to be paid at the rate of $600,000 annually) could have a multiplying effect.

At a March 2022 meeting at SEMO, Gov. Mike Parson told area educators he is coupling federal COVID-19-related funds with surplus state funds to create a pool of money for a wide range of projects. He noted projects that will receive funding will be those supported at the local level.

"We won't just be writing a check," he said. "'Partner' will be the key word."

With more than $22 million in local funding, SEMO can make a strong case for additional partnerships with the state and others.

As was said Monday, the stadium serves as the gateway to Downtown Cape Girardeau. It should be a showpiece. When complete, the new facility will be. Not only will the first phase be the competitive home to Redhawks football and soccer beginning later this year, it will also vie to host regional and statewide events that the existing structure simply couldn't handle.

This is an investment that will show immediate dividends.

One quibble: Though behind-the-scenes conversations had obviously taken place regarding the proposal, the first the public heard about the possible investment on the city's part came tucked away in an agenda released three days before Monday's vote. Several people at the meeting questioned the proposal, wondering about the rush to approve it. University officials and council members made convincing arguments for the investment. Had they made their plan known in advance and taken more time to explain it before agreeing to an eight-figure expenditure, those questions might not have arisen.

While the decision is a good and legitimate one, the process certainly was not transparent. That's a shame, again, for a local governmental entity to show it doesn't trust its constituents to be engaged in community deliberations.