Stokes: State must support effort to bring back races - 4/30/2010
Newport Daily News
AMERICA’S CUP
Stokes: State must support effort to bring back races
By Joe Baker
Daily News staff
NEWPORT — While local leaders trumpet the area’s sailing conditions in their efforts to convince organizers to return the America’s Cup races to Newport, that probably will not be a factor in the ultimate decision, according to Keith W. Stokes, executive director of the state Economic Development Corp. And while he believes the state has a legitimate chance to bring the races back to Newport for the first time since 1983, it has to be willing to invest in necessary infrastructure to support the event, Stokes told members of the Newport County Chamber of Commerce on Thursday during a breakfast forum. The event at the Best Western Mainstay Inn was part of the EDC’s statewide “Listening Tour.”
In February, San Franciscobased BMW Oracle, headed by software mogul Larry Ellison, defeated the defending champion Swiss Alinghi to bring the Cup back to the United States. Although Oracle calls the Golden Gate Yacht Club in San Francisco home, Ellison signaled he is open to considering other venues for the Cup defense, likely in 2014. Ellison said he would release criteria that he will consider in making his decision next week, Stokes said.
Anyone associated with sailing already knows that Newport offers some of the best sailing in the world, Stokes said. It is the logistics that ultimately will seal the deal for the site of the next Cup races, he said. And although Rhode Island has experience in hosting the races, it no longer has the same support facilities it did 30 years ago, he said.
“Ellison knows our weather, winds and water. That is not going to get us the America’s Cup,” Stokes said. “We have not maintained our marinerelated assets. We need to put our money where our comments are and build worldclass marine assets.”
Since Newport last hosted the Cup, it has lost a lot of the waterfront amenities that once supported the event, Stokes said. The state would have to borrow money to make the improvements needed to once again host the races, he said.
But, Stokes said, the economic impact of the races would more than make up for that expenditure — and the improvements would benefit the state long after the races are over.
“We have a lot of inherent advantages,” Stokes said. “But we have to make it clear … we are in this for real.”
The state has as many hotel rooms within 50 miles as San Francisco, Stokes said. Since some of the expected challengers will be European, it would be cheaper for those syndicates to transport their boats to the East Coast than San Francisco, he said.
Gov. Donald L. Carcieri appointed Stokes to head a committee to put together the state’s pitch for the Cup races. The committee is looking at turning Fort Adams State Park into race headquarters (see story on Page A8), dividing up the area to house as many as 11 racing syndicates that could take part in the races.
Rhode Island faces stiff competition. San Francisco also is putting on a full-court press to lure the Cup races there. In a March 3 letter to Ellison, the neighboring island city of Alameda trumpeted a 1.4-acre former naval air station there as a perfect site for support services.
“Nearly a third of the island’s west end is occupied by the former Naval Air Station Alameda,” according to the letter from the Alameda City Council. “This property … features wide open spaces with easy access to the San Francisco Bay; large warehouses that can accommodate ship building, repair and storage, and historic Navy executive homes which can serve as hostels for sailing syndicates, affording them personal living quarters as well as meeting and recreational opportunities.”
Send reporter Joe Baker e-mail at Baker@NewportRI.com.
‘We have to make it clear … we are in this for real.’ KEITH W. STOKES executive director of the state Economic Development Corp.
