Booster update

As always, great info from VP of Seminole Boosters, Jerry Kutz.


Locker Room Renovation??

Jerry Kutz
5/28/2014

"The locker room, coaches suites and Champions Hall Apartment Complex/football dorm will be completed before the start of August practice.

The locker room will have some high tech features in locker design and will add a head coach's game day office in what was the player's lounge. We'll renovate the hallways leading to the locker room update the coaches office suites.  Athletics is looking at a phase two project (next year) to create a much bigger player's lounge and renovate all of the segment meeting rooms.

Seminole Boosters will launch a capital campaign in July that will offer naming opportunities in each of these facilities as well as the IPF.

We'll also launch a campaign to make renovations to Doak that will sandblast, weld, replace, prime and paint the core stadium and make as many concourse improvements as our fundraising campaign will allow. A club seat project around the University Center Club has been proposed and will go before the BOT and BOG which would generate the revenue to fund a bond issue for more extensive improvements to Doak.

We're looking to launch the Champions Campaign in July 2016 and start the big stadium projects sometime after the 2015 season pending approvals from the boards, fundraising success and the bonding process. The stadium projects could take two off seasons to complete."



"The Champions Hall apartment complex is being built by Seminole Boosters and will house both our football team and more than enough regular FSU students to meet the NCAA requirements, so the players will have the best of both worlds. They will have a place where they can all live together, and your leaders can lead, yet have the diversity of general student housing which is important in recruiting too.

No need to try to skirt any NCAA rules,

Two players will share a two bedroom, two bath unit so they will each have their own bedroom and bath, sharing a kitchen, living room. The facility will be built like a dormitory with a secure lobby and all rooms accessed by an interior hallway. Auburn completed a similar structure a year or two ago and believes it helped pull their team back together improving team chemistry and accountability.

Fisher said the IPF was priority 1 and the dorm priority 2. In August he will have both.

Even though Champions Hall will generate a positive cash flow from rental income, we will make the project part of the Champions Campaign offering naming opportunities ranging from $1000 up to $3 million.

We'll have a site dedicated to the Champions Campaign starting July 1."



"When we get all the scholarships endowed is largely up to you, our Seminole fans and Boosters. What I mean by that is every one of our capital campaigns -- including the Champions Campaign -- offers donors the opportunity to choose to give money toward the scholarship endowment. Some choose to give to scholarships but many choose to give to facilities.

We ran a campaign a few years ago that was geared up for scholarships yet many of the people who gave designated their gift towards facilities.

The key to successful fundraising is being donor centric. You have to offer an array of choices to your donors to inspire a passion gift and we certainly have a variety of needs to offer including scholarships.

Our longterm strategy for endowing scholarships also includes will and estate gifts. Many people like to see their money at work during their lifetime building facilities because it is tangible and urgent. When it comes to leaving their last gift, many choose the scholarship endowment because it is a gift that lasts forever. When those people pass away -- and I hope it isn't any time soon -- their estate will pass to the scholarship endowment and we will see growth in the endowment fund. We have several people who have left their life estate which would move the needle significantly.

In the meantime, we ask and encourage people to give to the endowment. And we create revenue generating projects (like Champions Hall and College Town and hopefully the Club Seat section) that generate revenue to fund the athletics budget so that we can avoid tapping into the earnings on the endowment fund and let the interest compound upon itself.

You all need to realize that VERY FEW athletic programs are fully endowed. Stanford I hear is but I don't know of another. North Carolina is significantly ahead of Florida State and Florida has more in their endowment but they are not close to fully endowed either.

To give you an idea of why, consider this: Right now it would take an endowment of about $190 million to fully fund scholarships at today's costs (over $9 million with 20 sports) if you could earn 5 percent on the endowment. But the cost of scholarships will continue to rise as tuition, housing, food, fees, etc. will constantly grow. So if scholarship costs rise to $10 million, you'd have to increase the endowment to $200 million to remain fully funded. Add a sport like soccer or lacrosse and you'd have to increase the endowment more.

Make sense?

In the meantime you have to fund your operating budget to remain competitive. You have to build facilities that will attract and retain the brightest coaches and players. And you have to improve the gameday experience for your fans who are tempted to stay home and watch games on television which is the greatest threat to athletics budgets.

There is work that MUST be done on Doak and there is work that NEEDS to be done on Doak to keep people coming. We ran a campaign a few years ago that was geared up for scholarships yet many of the people who gave designated their gift towards facilities.

Sandblasting, welding, priming, painting HAVE TO BE DONE to keep Doak safe and maintained.

Improved concourses, restrooms, concessions, WiFi, scoreboard improvements DO NOT HAVE to be done for safety but they NEED to be done to create a experience that keeps people coming rather than staying at home.

If we had all the money in the world, we would do all the things people demand on these message boards. But, like most of us, FSU has to prioritize based on our income. By state law athletics cannot operate a deficit budget nor can we borrow money without a revenue stream to secure it. Thus the Champions Club generates revenue that increases our bonding capacity and will allow us to tackle some of the HAVE TO BE DONE and NEED TO BE DONE projects.

Make sense?"



"We very well could have it done by the 2016 season if all goes well with the red tape and fundraising. We managed to get the IPF done in record time (and Champions Hall which will be done in July) so we do have a history for raising money and building things rapidly. This is a particularly challenging project as you are working with a big, old, existing structure parts of which have to be disassembled before you can sandblast, weld, prime and paint.

I think the fundraising side will go well as we have projects people will want to support with scholarships and football facilities where our players live, work and play. I think people will also enjoy voluntarily giving to improve Doak, improvements that will make their game day experience better.

The revenue engine that will drive many of these improvements will be the Champions Club seating section. It can generate enough revenue to support the bonds we will need to do the stadium improvements. If we can presell the Club Seat project and get BOT and BOG approval we can secure the bonding this time next year (2015) and start the work right after the last home game in the third week of November 2015. We think the right contractors can have the project completed by Sept. 1 of 2016. If not, they may be substantially complete to where they can finish during the season (taking Friday and Saturday off for the seven home games)."


"There's been thought to a field level box like Bama has in that South Endzone but maybe not enough thought. It could be cool and I will discuss it with our architects. We're still in the early planning stages and will do some additional surveys and a lot more detailed drawings before we go to bid next year. "