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Council authorizes negotiations with Sports Performance Hub to renovate Harris Field
Summary
After a multi‑hour presentation, the council authorized staff to pursue noncompetitive negotiations with Sports Performance Hub to renovate Harris Field stadium under an unsolicited P3 proposal. SPH proposed about $5.5M in capital improvements and to cover annual operating costs estimated at $1–1.5M; council conditioned negotiations on scheduling, noise mitigation and public‑input coordination.
On July 7 the council voted to authorize staff to pursue a public‑interest determination and enter noncompetitive negotiations with Sports Performance Hub (SPH) on an unsolicited concession proposal to renovate and operate Harris Field stadium. SPH representatives described a roughly $5.4–5.5 million capital program that would replace the worn playing surface with a state‑of‑the‑art artificial turf, widen the field for soccer, upgrade lighting to LED, replace scoreboards, renovate concession and restroom buildings and reconfigure seating and premium viewing areas to reach roughly 5,000 safe seats.
SPH said the build would include a food‑court/beer‑garden amenity, new LED scoreboards and programming capacity to host approximately 20 Miami FC home matches per season, youth clinics, tournaments and weekend music events. The team estimated it would assume annual operations and maintenance costs in the $1,000,000–$1,500,000 range and would market and secure tournaments to generate regional visitors.
Council members supported the idea’s potential to activate the park and generate downtown spillover but insisted on firm protections: guaranteed continued access for existing local programs (high schools, youth leagues, rodeo uses), a detailed schedule to avoid displacing regular users, explicit noise‑mitigation and speaker‑control measures, and community outreach coordinated with the city’s Harris Park reimagination consultant. Several members asked for explicit timelines and for proof that the proposer's construction schedule could meet the council’s target season start if a fast track was desired.
Outcome: by roll call vote the council authorized staff to pursue the noncompetitive public‑interest track, commence due diligence, schedule required public outreach meetings and begin negotiating terms and operational controls. Staff said it will work with the parks department, police and the reimagination consultant to address scheduling, security and acoustical mitigation in draft terms.
