Veazie firm to buy Lewiston ice arena

LEWISTON – City councilors have approved a $1 million sale of the Androscoggin Bank Colisee.

Tuesday’s vote was 5-2.

The deal transfers ownership of the Colisee to Firland Management, based in Veazie, and its president, Jim Cain.

Firland is to begin paying the city $50,000 per year in 2013 and then $100,000 per year from 2023 through 2028.

The deal gives Firland until April 2009 to officially assume ownership.

Cain has until noon Friday to come up with $250,000 in collateral to guarantee his company’s side of the deal.

According to terms, Firland would continue to honor the contract with the Lewiston Maineiacs semiprofessional hockey team.

The sale would end the city’s subsidy of the ice arena, which reached $488,000 last year. It does not erase the $5.7 million in debt the city has accrued since 2004 to renovate and improve the facility.

“Investing all that money like we’ve done, and then turning around and selling it for less than we’ve invested is a lot like running your fingernails over a chalkboard,” Councilor Tom Peters said. “It grates me. I don’t like it at all, but at the same time, if it’s going to cost me a half-million a year to stay there, I can’t do that.”