Niagara Falls isn’t the first community in New York to consider building a sports arena to boost its economy.
A review of existing arenas similar in size and scope to Mayor Robert Restaino’s proposed $210 million Centennial Park plan reveals, at best, mixed results.
In 2019, reporters representing USA Today New York conducted an analysis of arenas operating across the state, outside of New York City.
They found such facilities were “mainly owned by taxpayers, putting strain on local budgets amid limited tax revenue and growing costs.” They also determined most arenas outside the Big Apple were barely breaking even or were losing money.
“If not for public subsidies, the majority would have already closed,” USA Today concluded following its arena review conducted prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.
There are a couple of examples where a combination of community support, corporate partnerships, minor league and youth sports, concerts and other events have helped arena managers to at least maintain operations and, at times, enjoy success in terms of attendance and support.
Here’s a look at the background of several arenas currently operating in small cities in other parts of the state:
ELMIRA’S STRUGGLES
Elmira, a city with a population of just over 26,000, opened what is now known as the LECOM Event Center in the year 2000. The venue offers two ice surfaces, a video game arcade, a restaurant and bar, 31 luxury suites and meeting space. It had a total construction cost of $16 million.
The arena is listed in the Centennial Park feasibility study prepared for the City of Niagara Falls by the private consulting firm Sports Facilities Advisory, LLC as one of four event centers “in similar markets and of similar size” to the 6,000- to 7,000-seat arena envisioned by Restaino.
Located in downtown Elmira, the LECOM Center holds 3,748 seats. It originally served as the home rink for the Elmira Jackals, an expansion franchise awarded to the city by the United Hockey League.
Financial troubles set in seven years after the facility’s construction when the original arena operator, Elmira Downtown Arena, fell behind on its tax payments.
In 2016, the Chemung County Industrial Development Agency assumed temporary ownership of the arena and the Jackals hockey team. In the years that followed, the facility bounced between public and private ownership amid continued financial struggles and repair needs. The county’s IDA took over management of the facility in 2023.
The Jackals franchise folded in 2017, giving way to a series of minor league hockey teams that played in the Federal Prospects Hockey League, including the Enforcers, the Mammoth and the River Sharks. The center is now home to the Elmira Aviators, a Tier II junior ice hockey team in the North American Hockey League.
A 2024 financial report for the venue projected an operating loss for the year of $466,550. According to the report, the arena lost $446,038 from January to October that same year.
Last January, Chemung County Executive Christopher Moss threatened to withhold funds for the arena amid concerns raised about lack of financial accountability, inadequate record keeping and operating losses.
“While many see the arena as the nucleus of downtown Elmira, its inability to maintain a constant fan base or experience an annual profit or break even is verified by the numerous owners and operators since its opening in 2000,” Moss wrote in a Facebook post as reported by the Elmira Star-Gazette.
In July, the Chemung County IDA sold the venue to the owners of the Aviators hockey team.
In a release accompanying the sale’s announcement, the county’s IDA chair Mark Margeson touted the arena’s “significant impact” on the local economy, noting that 125 young hockey players lived at Elmira College and 30 to 40 attended the local Notre Dame High School.
Citing estimates from the Chemung County Chamber of Commerce, Margeson said, based on national spending averages for youth and travel hockey, out-of-town families spent between $500–$1,000 per trip on lodging, dining, gas, and entertainment in the community.
The transfer of ownership to the private management group, Stemerman Sports Entertainment, LLC was part of a larger push to bring more comedians, concerts and other events and activities to the struggling arena. It also involved the relocation of the American Tier III Hockey League team the Binghamton Buzz to Elmira.
The LECOM center’s website is currently promoting a pair of cover bands — “Houses of the Holy: A True (Led) Zeppelin Experience with The Rolling Stones Concert Experience” — as its top upcoming show this month. In prior years, the venue played host to an NCAA ice hockey tournament, WWE and TNA pro wrestling shows, comedians and musical performers, including Bob Dylan in 2002 and Willie Nelson in 2009.
BINGHAMTON’S BARN
Visions Veterans Memorial Arena opened as the Floyd L. Maines Veterans Memorial Arena in 1973. The 7,200-seat multi-purpose venue serves the Greater Binghamton Metropolitan area, which encompasses Broome and Tioga counties in southern upstate New York. The area had a population of just over 247,000 as of the 2020 Census.
The arena is home to the Binghamton Black Bears of the Federal Prospects Hockey League and previously served as home ice for American Hockey League teams, including the Binghamton Devils. Aerosmith, AC/DC and Dolly Parton are counted among the notable performers who took the stage at the arena in the past.
The arena is owned by the Broome County government and underwent a $2.5 million upgrade in 2013 that included seating replacement and the installation of LED lighting, new dasher boards and glass. Management secured a $375,000 grant from New York state for additional upgrades in 2021. Last year, a new basketball court was installed to better accommodate college and professional events. The move allowed the arena to host the New York State Public High School Athletic Association (NYSPHSAA) Boys Basketball Championships for the first time since 2019 and to secure rights to the event through 2027.
THE GLENS FALLS ARENA
At one point, things got so bad for the Glens Falls Civic Center that community leaders in Warren County auctioned it off to the highest bidder.
A community group, the “Coalition to Save Our Civic Center,” stepped in and purchased the 4,794-seat venue, built for $3 million during an urban renewal effort in 1979, for $600,000.
The Saratogian reported in 2018 that the facility, once considered a “financial albatross,” closed out the prior year in the black. At the time, the venue had a $2.7 million operating budget and hosted about 85-90 events per year, with the list of guest entertainers running the gamut from country music singers Brantley Gilbert and Kenny Rogers to WWE wrestling, high school athletics and the Harlem Globetrotters.
The facility, which was renamed the Harding Mazzotti Arena following a naming rights deal struck with a local law last year, has also had some struggles and is currently in the design phase of a major project — replacing a key piece of operational equipment known as the ice chilling machinery.
For the first two decades of the arena’s operation, it served as home to the Adirondack Red Wings, an American Hockey League team that served as the minor league affiliate to the NHL’s Detroit Red Wings. After the Red Wings departed in 1999, several other minor league hockey teams followed in Binghamton, including the IceHawks, the Phantoms and the Flames. The arena is currently home to the Adirondack Thunder, an ECHL minor league hockey team affiliated with the NHL’s New Jersey Devils.
In addition to Thunder games, the venue’s website currently offers tickets to an upcoming “Sesame Street Live Event, Elmo’s Got The Moves” event.
The Grateful Dead played several shows at the Glens Falls Arena, with the most recent happening in 1982. Four years later, Mike Tyson had a professional fight in the arena at the age of 19. The Who kicked off their 25th anniversary tour at the venue in 1989.
In 2024, the venue, which operated as the Cool Insuring Arena at the time, lost out to Binghamton in its bid to host New York State boys’ high school basketball tournament.
A report on the failed bid included a reference by the city’s Mayor Bill Collins to the arena’s good and not-so-good years, including his suggestion that, “for roughly 30 years,” the venue “always struggled to break even” and “rarely actually broke even.”
“In some budget years, it might cost about $200,000 to manage and pay the employees and keep the lights on in the Civic Center,” Collins told WAMC Northeast Public Radio in 2024. “And those were the prosperous years. And then during other struggle years, it would cost us as much as $500,000.”
ADIRONDACK BANK CENTER
The Adirondack Bank Center at the Utica Memorial Auditorium holds 3,999 seats and is large enough to accommodate 5,700 guests during concerts. Nicknamed “the Aud,” the venue is home to the Utica Comets, an American Hockey League team affiliated with the NHL’s New Jersey Devils. The arena also plays host to Utica City FC, a team from the Major Arena Soccer League.
It is currently managed by Mohawk Valley Garden, a private corporation that counts among its partners former NHL goalie Robert Esche, the Comets’ current president.
Upcoming events listed on the arena’s website include a WWE NXT live event, the 2026 Division III “Frozen Four” Men’s Ice Hockey Championship and a chocolate and wine festival called “Sip and Sweets.”
Along with local businessman Frank DuRoss, Esche is credited with helping to revive Utica’s hockey spirit by reviving minor league hockey in the community with the Comets, which serve as the venue’s anchor tenant and No. 1 draw.
In their 2019 analysis, reporters from USA Today New York noted that many smaller arenas in smaller communities such as the Adirondack Bank Center struggle to compete for mainstream concerts and events, which often choose bigger venues in larger cities like Buffalo or Rochester.
Their report noted that smaller cities tend to target smaller shows, such as minor league sports, pro wrestling, truck shows and youth sports.
It also noted that in Binghamton and Glens Falls, the hockey rinks were rented out to youth teams most nights to help support as healthy a bottom line as possible.
“I think the viability of these are how creative can you get to create revenue with the square footage that you have,” Esche said. “We have a building that is extremely antiquated, but we have the ability to generate revenue from every pocket of the building.”