A few executives from the Edmonton Oilers were in Quebec City on Wednesday to meet with officials there and discuss arena funding issues. Quebecor Media Inc., one of the largest news agencies in Canada, the operator of Sun Media Corp. picked up the story and ran it as, "the Oilers are moving to Quebec City!"
Not Going Anywhere: Oilers Execs Travel To Quebec City To Discuss Arena Funding, Not Relocation
QMI has a reputation of stretching the truth and sensationalizing things a bit, but when a story shows up on the Web sites of major newspapers in each major Canadian city, it makes people freak out. Twitter exploded with “what? why!?!” stuff while reporters tried to get to the bottom of the issue.
David Staples of The Edmonton Journal got an answer from Bob Black, VP at the Katz Group, which owns the team.
”Edmonton Oilers’ President and CEO Patrick LaForge, President of Hockey Operations Kevin Lowe and Katz Group CFO Paul Marcaccio met today with Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume and others. Our representatives are on a fact finding mission to gather information on the Quebec arena project, the contemplated funding model and that City’s discussions with other orders of government.
“Patrick, Kevin and Paul hope to learn from the Quebec City experience and bring back insights that will help move the process forward here in Edmonton. We remain focused on our efforts to develop the funding structure required to enable the Edmonton Arena District project to proceed. Today was a convenient date for the meeting in Quebec City since the Oilers are already in nearby Montreal to play the Canadiens and our group is with the team.”
The Oilers have had widely-publicized problems in getting the local government to back a new arena plan, and it makes sense that officials would like to pick the brains of those in Quebec City, where they’ve received government support on a new arena plan of their own.
Meanwhile, Oilers CEO Patrick LaForge pushed back as well.
“We’re both building facilities and we’re both trying to get them off the ground and we have a hockey team and perhaps they don’t here, but there is no reason for that to be drawn together….and we are not planning to move the Oilers at this time,” said LaForge.
The Edmonton Oilers are not moving to Quebec City, in fact, it’s quite the opposite. They’re just trying to get better information on a way to stay in Edmonton. No need to freak out.
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