Joliet stadium agreement terms still under wraps

The Joliet City Council Stadium Committee on Monday will try to find out details about a two-week-old naming rights agreement for the city-owned stadium but may not find out much.

Stadium Committee Chairman Pat Mudron said Friday that he also wants to know whether the city has in some way signed off on the agreement yet to be seen by the council.

Mudron said he will be looking for “a copy of the agreement and all the information about what DuPage Medical is paying and not paying” when the committee meets.

But interim City Manager Martin Shanahan said he does not plan to make the agreement available to the committee when it meets Monday.

“I want to respect the rights of our corporate sponsor,” Shanahan said.

Shanahan said he wants to meet with sponsor DuPage Medical Group and the Slammers “before I talk off the cuff.”

The naming rights agreement was announced by DuPage Medical Group and the Slammers, who manage the stadium and negotiated the agreement, on May 21. Details, including how much money the city gets from the agreement, have not been disclosed.

Shanahan said it has taken some time to arrange the meeting because of the recent death of the chief executive officer of DuPage Medical Group. CEO Michael A. Kasper died May 4.

A Slammers executive has described the value of the agreement as “confidential.”

The city and the Slammers each get half of whatever a corporate sponsor pays for naming rights.

Joliet also must approve the agreement, according to the Slammers’ lease with the city.

Shanahan would not say how much money the city is getting but described it as a tiny fraction of the city budget.

Silver Cross Hospital paid up to $150,000 a year in a 15-year naming rights deal signed when the stadium opened in 2002. But the stadium has gone two years without a naming sponsor since the contract ended.

“It’s not what the money is or the cut,” Shanahan said. “It’s about the prestige of having a major corporate sponsor for our stadium.”

Mudron said he also wants to determine whether the Joliet Route 66 Stadium name that the city gave the stadium in 2017 still will be used.

The Slammers now are calling the stadium DuPage Medical Group Field.