Someday next year, a crowd will gather.
Blue and gray bunting will surround a pile of dirt where once there was a tennis court. Coaches, players, dignitaries all, the group will all applaud at a shovel in the ground for a long delayed project and congratulate everyone on having come this far. After nearly seven years of hopes and dreams, the really big gift didn’t come in, but enough of the six figure ones did so that the generically named "Intercollegiate Athletics Center" can oneday say it will be underway. Once a project starts, it gets built.
Just don’t look too far over your shoulder.
A stone’s throw from the future site of the IAC stands Georgetown’s ongoing exercise in inertia, which today passes 3,000 days since construction was halted upon it. On September 17, 2005, with temporary seats left in place for the remainder of the 2005 season, the site once called “the most significant project in the history of Georgetown athletics” was inaugurated in a 34-3 loss to Brown.
And when the Bruins returned this fall, almost nothing had changed.
Because nothing has changed.
“Rumors abound that Harbin Field will eventually be turned into a real stadium, to be used by such teams as soccer, football and lacrosse. If this is the case, it will be a major boost for campus ... The university should do all that it can to provide better accommodations; after all, having sports on campus for all to enjoy follows the Jesuit ideal of educating the whole person - mind and body. We already have the teams ... now let's live up to our reputation and give them the facilities they deserve."
If this HOYA editorial sounds familiar, well, you’ve been reading this site too long. It was authored on November 17, 1999, 14 years ago. This is a project that has spanned three U.S. presidents, three Popes, three full time athletic directors, not to mention some 30,000 Georgetown graduates across its various schools. While not the longest delayed project at the University (the legal wrangling on the boathouse enters its 27th year in 2014), it is certainly among the more visible ones. Hundreds of prospective students pass by it each day, with more than its share of nonplussed comments by tour guides or the off-putting response, “but we’re no good at football anyway.”
There was a time when comments were uniformly more positive.
“In the first phase, a new playing surface, visitor’s stands on the east side and other game-day facility needs will be installed. This portion of the project is slated to begin following the end of this fall’s competition schedule with completion by September 2005,” wrote a Hoyas Unlimited newsletter in August 2004.
More follows:
“In the second phase, slated for completion in the fall of 2006, additional amenities will be added, and the focus will be on the home (west) side. New home stands will be constructed. Underneath the stands will be locker rooms, a training room and storage space. A new press box will be added and lights will be installed. This phasing is being done to accommodate a road realignment taking place on the west side of the facility around the same time. To date, over $12.7 million in cash and pledges has been raised for the new Multi-Sport Facility.“
To say this project has had its share of turns is an understatement. At least five different designs have come and gone. And where once Georgetown would comment that the project was just around the corner, perhaps they have learned the lesson of the U.S. government bureaucracy that no starting date means you’re never behind. The last public statement on the progress of this project at GUHoyas.com was over four years ago.
“In the year to come, we are focusing on developing a strategic plan for two major projects, the completion of which would benefit all of our teams and the University community as a whole,” wrote GU vice president Dan Porterfield (C’83) in September 2009, serving as an interim athletic director between the tenures of Bernard Muir and Lee Reed. Wrote Porterfield:
“First, it is crucial that we complete the Multi-Sport Field, which hosts not only our football and lacrosse games, but also intramurals, club sports, and events such as the annual all-night Relay for Life, a major fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. Though improvements have been made to the field in the last few years, the project remains unfinished and still requires significant investment to complete.
"For that reason, I have asked colleagues in Athletics and the University to see if we can develop a cost-effective approach to completing the field. Our goals will stay the same: to improve our teams' game-day experience, to make the venue more fan-friendly, and to construct an aesthetically pleasing facility. As we develop new options for this important project in the coming months, we look forward to sharing its details with our friends and donors.“
And that’s part of the problem. Muir wanted little to do with a project that was assembled before his watch. Reed inherited the project amidst the growing heat that John Thompson III didn’t have a practice facility. Reed won’t be judged on what happens to the MSF, because priority 1 is the IAC. Kevin Kelly doesn’t talk about it publicly, but why would he? It’s been just another roadblock in his recruiting efforts.
Georgetown even went to the unusual step of washing its hands of the MSF in advance of the current capital campaign, noting in its campaign literature that “The Multi–Sport Field was one of the later priorities of the last campaign. Although substantial funds were raised, they were insufficient to complete the project in its ultimate, very expansive scope. The funds raised to date, together with university investment, were used to build the core of the facility, including a new playing field, lighting, scoreboards and stands. We are working to complete the second and final phase of the work outside the context of this campaign. ‘
(In its most recent iteration, the comments on the MSF no longer appear in the online FAQ.)
All of this inaction over this project is not some of struggle against football or athletics. Far from it. It merely plays to an academic bent where little, if anything can be done in a timely manner. What’s a few years in the life of a 225 year old University? After all, it took 23 years to get McDonough Gymnasium built, and stately Gaston Hall sat as an unfinished shell inside the Healy Building for the better part of two decades.
Georgetown has “conversations” on the MSF. It maintains “dialogue”. It seeks “opportunities” to see progress. These are words better suited to a discussion on ethics, not construction projects, and certainly not projects where money was raised and accepted. And according to that story cited above, $12.7 million is not an insignificant number.
Full disclosure: I made a gift of $1,000 to the Multi-Sport Facility when the project was still in active fundraising. In the interim, I’ve not received any correspondence from Georgetown University informing me of the status of my gift (technically, a seat at the new field), what became of the gift, if they want any more money from me, or if they simply reallocated the amount for something else.
Because a the bottom of all this, this project is all about commitment, one which unfortunately speaks loud and clear to recruits, to parents, and to fellow coaches. It’s hurt football recruiting, even if people won’t say it, and it has hurt lacrosse recruiting, even if people won’t say that, either. How can Georgetown be committed to sports like football if it doesn’t even finish what it started?
The University doesn’t need a replica of AT&T Stadium for a facility, even if Jerry Jones himself is the parent of an football alum. It doesn’t need another Byrd Stadium, named after a former Georgetown quarterback, no less. Porterfield’s goals in that 2009 letter were simple and direct: “To improve our teams' game-day experience, to make the venue more fan-friendly, and to construct an aesthetically pleasing facility.”
This project needs ownership and a frank discussion with its donors about what it is prepared to do…and what it expects its donors to do in return. And those in McDonough Gym that are used to my squawking about this subject understand it’s not personal, that despite talk that things are getting closer, some of us have heard that offer for too many years now.
In the meantime, day 3,000 will be day 3,001 before we know it.
