School Board decides against building a stadium at Citizens Field, asks for more options

BY JENNIFER CABRERA

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – At the June 16 School Board of Alachua County meeting, the board approved a list of principal transfers and voted 4-1 to ask staff to bring back other options for stadiums after deciding against building a new stadium at Citizens Field.

Principal transfers for 2026-27

The following principals are being transferred, effective July 1:

• Jared Taber (Oak View Middle) to Kanapaha Middle
• Kelly Armstrong (SFHS) to Mebane Middle School
• Christopher Beland (Williams Elementary) to Duval Early Learning
• Laura Creamer (Meadowbrook Elementary) to Wiles Elementary
• Tami Delaney (Parker Elementary) to Meadowbrook Elementary
• Sherry Estes (Kanapaha Middle) to Santa Fe High School
• Margaret Gardiner (Duval Early Learning) to Littlewood Elementary
• Katherine Munn (Wiles Elementary) to Oak View Middle
• Justin Russell (Littlewood Elementary) to Williams Elementary
• Anyana Stokes (Foster Elementary) to Parker Elementary

Citizens Field purchase contract and Interlocal Agreement

[Editor’s note: The board voted against approving these documents, but this section describes the terms of the contract and Interlocal Agreement that were discussed at the June 16 meeting.]

The purchase price for the stadium property (4.783 acres) is $500,000, with a deposit of $100,000 that begins a due diligence period; the School Board (SBAC) may terminate the contract at any time during this period, and the deposit will be returned. However, any issues that are found after the purchase is complete will be the responsibility of the SBAC. 

The purchase agreement includes an Interlocal Agreement between SBAC and the City of Gainesville that requires SBAC to pay half the remediation costs, estimated at a total of $4.9 million. The estimated cost of building a stadium is between $22 million and $25 million, paid entirely by SBAC. The City, meanwhile, will pay for improvements that include constructing or providing utilities, paved vehicular access and parking facilities, stormwater facilities, and landscaping on City property that serves the stadium. 

The stadium and required improvements will include a natural or synthetic turf playing field, seating for 3,000 to 5,000 spectators, a press box with media facilities, home and visitor locker rooms with restroom and shower facilities, concession stands, public restrooms, scoreboards, lighting, paved parking, fencing, and stormwater management facilities.

Scheduling priority will be given to regularly scheduled high school football games, playoff and championship events, high school graduation ceremonies, FHSAA state-level events, and other SBAC events. The next tier of priority includes City- and County-sponsored recreational athletic leagues, community-wide events, and City- and County-sponsored concerts or other events. The third tier includes youth athletic leagues, college or university events, private events, and commercial rentals. The City may request up to five events per year.

SBAC is responsible for maintaining the stadium and the associated improvements constructed by the City.

The City has 24 months from the closing date to complete its required improvements, and SBAC must complete the stadium within 18 months of either the completion date of the required improvements or the date that the design and permitting of the stadium are complete, whichever is later.

Public comment on Citizen Field

During public comment, School Board Candidate Gabriel Lopez asked the board to pause on the stadium purchase contract, saying it was rushed, “without adequate time for review,” and “highly suspicious and questionable.” Paula Stahmer referred to Jenn Garrett’s Letter to the Editor at Alachua Chronicle, which advocated for smaller stadiums for each high school instead of a single shared stadium. Stahmer said, “It all seems rather vague and gives the appearance that you yourselves don’t have all the information you need to make a sound decision. So I urge you to kick the can down the road and take a closer look at this.”

Jancie Vinson, who was elected without opposition to the School Board District 5 seat and will be sworn in in November, also asked the board to pause: “You do have solutions; you’ve got other areas for a stadium. We do need a sports stadium, but also at what cost?”

Rochelle George asked them to pause and do “a full feasibility study… on upgrading existing facilities at our three high schools before committing millions to what the City itself has labeled as a Brownfield… Citizens Field could turn into an endless money pit with decades of financial and environmental risk… Why put this burden on our schools and our students?”

A Buchholz High School parent said it costs the football team and band about $110,000 a year (combined), “over half a million dollars over a four-year period,” to transport students to Citizens Field, a cost that could be avoided if there was a stadium at the school. She said that instead of spending three hours to attend a football game, like other schools with their own stadiums, busing the students and equipment to Citizens Field can take from early in the morning until midnight. 

Board discussion

While introducing the agenda item, Superintendent Kamela Patton said high schools often share stadiums in Florida, and “this new stadium would feature a state-of-the-art synthetic field… Modern turf systems are designed to create consistent playing surfaces that help reduce injuries.” She said it will also drain quickly after a heavy rainfall, which reduces game delays and cancellations. She reminded the board and the audience that capital funds cannot be used for employee salaries or operating expenses, so this “does not divert resources from teacher or staff raises.” She added that this is the “most cost-efficient option currently available to the district… None [of the other potential locations] provide the same combination of affordability, accessibility, and long-term value.”

First motion

Member Tina Certain made a motion to move forward with the initial signing of the contract so that the district can begin the environmental evaluation of Citizens Field. Member Sarah Rockwell seconded the motion.

Chair Thomas Vu thanked the board for agreeing to table the contract at their previous meeting. He said, however, that his “misgivings just increased, and getting my questions answered still left me with a lot of things I don’t like about the way this contract is laid out.” He said he was afraid that the contract language allows the City to delay until the district is in breach of the contract, and the district’s only defense mechanism would be to sell the land back: “There’s nothing in here that compensates us for time.” He was also concerned that the City could lose property tax revenue if the homestead exemption constitutional amendment passes, which could impact the GCRA funds that are currently identified as one funding source for the City’s portion of the work. 

Vu said he was concerned with entering into an agreement “with an entity that is going to be massively defunded, that’s already in a budget deficit, that may just not have the money to finish this project, and we could be in a situation three years from now where we have a partially built stadium with no parking and nothing else, and no other infrastructure, because the City can’t afford it, and then our only other option is to sell back the partially built stadium.”

Vu said he would prefer to build stadiums at Buchholz and Eastside, “then try to figure out an option for GHS.”

Member Leanetta McNealy was concerned with the risk the district was assuming, “especially when we found out most recently… about the City labeling the property as a Brownfield.” She wanted input sessions at each high school. She acknowledged that GHS is “certainly landlocked,” and she said she would “never” agree to a shared stadium for GHS if Eastside and Buchholz had their own stadiums. 

McNealy said she understood the benefit of having the stadium on the east side of town, but she also understood the costs of transporting students and equipment to every game and the lost opportunities to sell banners and store food and equipment in the concession stands. She said she would vote to “hold to [her] guns and pause this.”

Rockwell said she also had some misgivings with the contract “because I feel like there’s a lot of specificity around what the school district has to do and not a lot of specificity around what the City has to do.” She said they were only voting on the $100,000 deposit and performing the environmental studies, “with the ability to pull out for any reason.” She said she had heard that Buchholz might have room for a stadium but not enough room for the necessary stormwater mitigation; Executive Director of Facilities Planning, Construction, and Maintenance Suzanne Wynn said she could not say for sure either way without looking at it in more detail. Wynn added that the only way to fit a stadium at GHS would be to reconfigure the campus with more two-story buildings, for example.

Certain said they were “going down a rabbit hole,” and she said she wasn’t worried that the City would act in bad faith if they signed the contract: “I think we need to expect that they’ll deal honestly and fairly with us and move forward.” She said that residents of the east side would point to this as one more example of promising improvements in east Gainesville but not following through. She suggested negotiating additional terms with the City to alleviate the other board members’ concerns and asked the board members to “reconsider all the hesitancies that you have” because the district could still withdraw from the contract after the deposit is paid.

Patton said the City “didn’t declare [the field to be a Brownfield] at all; what they have said to us is that they will go ahead and look at that.”

Vu disagreed that they were kicking the can because “it shouldn’t have been our can, even to kick. We weren’t the ones making these promises for decades… The Mayor told me he doesn’t even want a stadium and that they are happy to build pickleball courts and soccer fields where the stadium is, and if that’s their position now, why are we even fighting so hard to do this… when they don’t even want it anymore?”

Certain said people would say “we come with any little excuse to not move the ball forward when it comes time to do something… in the east, but when things are done in the west, there’s all these concessions and things that are done to move forward.”

Member Janine Plavac said Lofton has enough property to build a stadium there, “and we can start fresh,… and we don’t have to deal with the City… Why not do a feasibility study about that?” She said that would save the environmental remediation and demolition expenses that would be necessary at Citizens Field. She also suggested looking at the Boys and Girls Club property.

Rockwell: Citizens Field was the “most fiscally responsible move.”

Rockwell said the Lofton option was previously presented to the board, and “part of it is that there’s additional costs and getting the infrastructure for utilities and plumbing and all of that. Citizens Fields already has it.” She added that when they previously looked at options, Citizens Field “was the most fiscally responsible move. Building multiple stadiums,… even if they were much more bare bones, would end up costing considerably more. Even building one stadium at a different site would still cost more, because of the infrastructure.”

Vote on the first motion

The vote on the motion to approve the contract with the City failed 1-4, with only Certain voting for the motion.

Second motion and vote

Certain made a motion to move forward with the environmental evaluation at Citizens Field and continue to negotiate with the City. Rockwell seconded the motion, and it failed 2-3, with only Certain and Rockwell in favor of the motion.

Certain said the environmental evaluation would have to be done “no matter what, if we proceed with Citizens Field,” so she asked the board members whether they were making a decision to stop any work toward building a stadium at Citizens Field. Rockwell said she had not heard a consensus for moving forward at Citizens Field.

Third motion

Vu said he preferred a “three-stadium option,” and Rockwell made a motion to ask staff to bring back a presentation of all of the available options. Plavac seconded the motion.

Patton asked what she should say to the City about the contract terms, and Vu said, “The motions to bring [the contract] back were already rejected, so I don’t even think we’re entertaining renegotiation at this point.”

Wynn said it would take time “to do a more thorough job at coming up with conceptual designs and costs,” and Vu said he was “okay with taking that time.”

Motion would require hiring a design professional

Wynn said she would bring back cost estimates for Lofton, Buchholz, Eastside, Citizens Field, Old Terwilliger, Diamond Sports Park, and options for GHS if there’s not enough land. Some of those sites would be for a single shared stadium, and some would be for the three-stadium option. Wynn said she would have to hire a design professional to do the conceptual designs, constraints, and order-of-magnitude cost comparisons; she said she wasn’t sure how long it would take. 

Certain: Board has been “very irresponsible… I think there will be some regrets.”

Certain said she thought the board had been “very irresponsible in letting 18 months lapse if you were not behind Citizens Field,… and the time and energy from staff, as well as the attorneys… We’re talking about concepts and plan and design when… we know Citizens Field works; it’s been working, and there’s no reason for it not to work in the future… I think… there will be some regrets… I think we’ve let our emotions get into this,… some feelings with the City, to kind of derail this at this point.” She said she thought this would end at a place that would not be good for GHS.

Member Rockwell: “I suspect that we’re going to be in a situation when all the options come back where we have squandered the most fiscally responsible option and are stuck with a worse option, but I’m going to be hopeful that that does not happen.”

Rockwell said she mostly agreed with Certain because she thought Citizens Fields was “the most fiscally responsible and equitable option, but that’s not the will of the board.” She said she thought the City Commission would feel “kind of betrayed after spending months on this, and I imagine our staff is feeling a bit frustrated at the moment.” She apologized to City and district staff and the attorneys. She concluded, “I suspect that we’re going to be in a situation when all the options come back where we have squandered the most fiscally responsible option and are stuck with a worse option, but I’m going to be hopeful that that does not happen.”

Vote on the third motion

The motion to have staff bring back other options passed 4-1, with Certain in dissent. 

The board did not discuss what they might do between the time when their agreement with the City for the use of Citizens Field expires and the construction of any new stadiums; they previously discussed having the high schools in the city share the stadiums at Newberry, Santa Fe, and Hawthorne High Schools.