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It should be a basic question: Who is paying for security for the seven World Cup matches at Gillette Stadium?
But at a Select Board meeting in Foxborough last week, there was more frustration than answers.
“I gotta be honest with you, it baffles my mind that you guys are sitting here in front of me right now and we still have no idea where this money’s coming from,” Mark Elfman, who sits on the town’s Select Board, said to representatives of FIFA and the local host committee.
With just months left before the first match is set to take place at Gillette, which will be called Boston Stadium during the Cup, the board is warning it could withhold an entertainment license needed for the games to go forward if the issue isn’t resolved.
“We’re not prepared to issue this license unless everything is in place,” Stephanie McGowan, the board’s vice chair, said. “And I’ve seen people saying, ‘Oh, there’s no way they won’t.’ I’m gonna tell you: This board will not issue this license.”
A big bill for a small town
In total, the associated security costs for the seven Gillette Stadium matches are projected to be $7.8 million. That’s a big price tag for just about any government.
And Foxborough, outside of Gillette, has about 18,000 residents. McGowan estimated that kind of money amounts to almost 10% of the town’s budget for a year.
Usually, the Kraft Group handles costs for security at games and concerts at Gillette. But FIFA is essentially renting out the stadium for the matches, making the responsibility a little murkier.
“Specifically, when it comes to public safety, we are contractually obligated to provide it,” said Mike Loynd, president of the local host committee.
So why the holdup? Loynd pointed to federal funding that should be coming through to help with security costs.
Federal grants typically reimburse host towns and cities for these kinds of costs, but Foxborough would have to cover the millions upfront — something the town’s select board isn’t ready to do.
“It’s still a question of how fast FEMA can move through the process,” Loynd said. “We’re being assured that it’s continuing.”
But in the meantime, that doesn’t help the town of Foxborough, which needs to see the money.
“It comes down to sounding like Foxborough is being the bad guys here, but we really aren’t. All we’re trying to do is protect our citizens,” said board chair Bill Yukna.
Clock ticking
The first World Cup match in Foxborough is scheduled for June 13 when Haiti takes on Scotland. Yukna said hosting the seven games is the equivalent of seven Super Bowls — which makes the pending question so close to the matches starting even more perplexing.
Holy Cross sports economist Victor Matheson believes that this may have been a contract screwup.
“This is a huge egg on the face of every lawyer involved with vetting this contract,” he said. “Because this never should have happened.”
As Matheson points out, it would be incredibly difficult to try to find alternative sites with all the work that’s gone into these games, and all the tickets that have already been sold — so it has to be worked out.
“There’s already a huge amount of planning that’s gone on to make sure that there are transportation and housing and practice facilities for the team’s coming in,” Matheson said. “This is going on here.”
Any resolution will have to come quickly, because the town’s deadline for the license is March 17.
For as frustrated as the town’s Select Board sounded, they also made clear that they want these games to go smoothly for everyone involved.
A spokesperson from the local host committee struck the same tone in a statement.
“All key stakeholders are collaboratively engaged in continued partnership, progress is being made daily and we remain confident we’ll reach a positive outcome over the coming weeks,” the statement read. “We are fully committed to delivering a world-class event at Gillette/Boston Stadium.”
