UNC's Smith Center - What Does Forever Mean? - IC Daily | College Basketball

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Welcome in and say, Krone, a daily four Wednesday, March the 11th.

I'm Tommy Ashley. That of course is Greg Barnes.

We are always sponsored by Johnny T shirt, Johnny T shirt, dot com.

Greg Barnes has dropped yet another column.

A, well, not a column, a solid piece or unbelievable piece of reporting on the origins of the Smith Center and the seat licenses and all the good things that they've come up in this debate about what to do with the current Smith Center.

And Greg, the origins are 40, 45 years ago in the making and they still ring very important.

Your column and work and article and reporting speaks for itself.

But I think I find it fascinating that we are discussing what does forever mean.

I've always thought it's pretty simple answer.

But evidently, it is not your take on all that.

It is. And this is really kind of working through all the documents and talking with a variety of people who were either involved or familiar with the process, you back in the early 80s.

It's, it's just enlightening to understand kind of what the thought process was, what they were trying to achieve the scope of it.

And now, in hindsight, it's, it's easy to kind of generate a perspective on it.

But at the time, it was unheard of for university to go through this type of process where an arena is privately owned.

Getting the money raised me at the time they were thinking there's going to be 30 and a half million.

But in 1981, that is a tremendous amount of money to be privately owned.

I don't know what the exact inflation ratio would be, but probably four times that now.

So it's like raising $125 million in short period to build an arena.

So just a daunting task.

And they were determined to make it work.

You know, Carmichael auditorium was, was busing at the seams.

While at the time it held, you know, 10,000 people.

And Dean Smith in his, in his book, coaches life, he talks about how, you know, it's not a bad thing when, when people are having a hard time getting tickets.

That means you're doing well and that, that bodes well for the program.

But at the same time, you know, he wanted more people to be able to attend and make sure that students and faculty would be able to attend.

And so he played a big role in this.

And there's a lot of big names in university history and the athlete department's history that kind of got together to come up with this whole concept.

And it's just a incredible story of what people can do when they come together for a common cause.

And I think at the time, there was probably a lot of stress involved with, hey, we have a very short timeframe in which we need to get all this money pledged and raised to be able to, you know, to put down down payments and get this process started.

That the goal with raising money, nobody was thinking, I think this is important to say, nobody was thinking, hey, you know, this is a building that's going to last for 100 years.

I mean, Carmichael, they played a Carmichael for 20 years.

So the idea that the Smith Center would still be, you know, in decent shape, 45 years later, and was, was being the situation that is in now.

I don't think anybody had that foresight and there's no reason for them to, but because of that, you know, some of the language with forever and in perpetuity.

Probably didn't seem like as big of a deal at the time in terms of posing a problem in the future.

And they probably thought it was necessary and beneficial to get people to buy in.

Now, of course, in hindsight, it's easy to draw a different opinion on that wording and, and how some of those deals were, you came to be.

But at the time, you, there was a goal in mind and they accomplished that goal.

And not only did they accomplish the goal of raising 30 and a half million, they raised 35 million, which allowed them to do a few different things.

So it's a, it's a fascinating story of how the Smith Center came to be.

And it's equally fascinating that here we are 45 years later, trying to figure out what the next step forward is.

If Carolina, you decide either to renovate or to build a new arena.

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It is in your work sort of details that is why folks need to, like I said, off the top, go to inside Carolina and get your premium subscription.

So you can read this and take part in the discussions.

I think a, I remember this time, and it was an amazing time that Carolina was going to be able to privately raise all this money and build a building at the time.

A cathedral to Carolina basketball and everybody came together.

And I remember the student debate on the fees and all that and how that's become relevant in your article talks about that.

But Greg, one part that sticks out to me and I think it's a relevant discussion.

And I don't know if it's something that anybody can answer other than the folks that wear the robes in the courtroom one day is.

The belief or the thought is it applied to this building, the Smith Center, the building over there on Skipper Bowles Drive that we're talking about.

But the language in all of this doesn't specifically say that these donations and this, these quote unquote contracts and I say that because you can explain that they're not.

I don't know if they're real contracts as far as sign on the dotted line and all that.

It's much more complicated than that, which is different from what I thought until really I dug into your article and have heard from a few people.

I mean, this is not a tear it down, build somewhere new and we're all good situation yet, at least, unless the courts have their say.

Yeah, and I think the ambiguity of some of the documentation is why there's there's questions about how to proceed forward.

You know, UNC is kind of pointed to you back in 2012 when they started looking at the bulls lot PSLs was was a big part of that and trying to kind of break free from some of those contracts just because of lack of clarity with some of it.

Yes, in a perfect world, especially given the current circumstances, there would be a very strict and detailed contract where everybody signed on the dotted line and everything was laid out specifically these seats only last for X number of years or for one or two generations.

If the building were to go away, this agreement ceases to exist.

That's not how the wording was.

You and see believes that if a new arena is built that the PSL agreements at the Smith Center were tied to that building.

When you look through the documentation, kind of what leads you to to think in that manner is that it was the student activity center building fund that generated all this documentation.

That would seem to suggest that it ties it specifically to the Smith Center as this today.

But in the actual language, there's nothing that says you forever means just for this building.

So it's not you kind of have to connect the dots. Well, this is for the student activity center, even though it may not say explicitly, you forever means this building.

I tend to agree with you and see his perspective from that standpoint. However, there is enough wiggle room there that it could be a legitimate question in the courtroom.

And that's part of the conversation as we get into you a lot of this talk.

Your UNC believes there's roughly 1,300 permits seat license accounts remaining.

And within those accounts, you've got four or 5,000 seats.

But the point I make in the story is that it's not a monolithic group. And just in people that we've talked to.

We've got some people who said, you know what, my family's had these tickets for 40, 45 years.

We've had a blast. It's been very impactful for our family.

We're okay with giving our licenses back.

We've gotten what we wanted out of them. Other people have said, you know, we made an agreement.

Understand that changes need to happen. That's part of the process.

We're willing to have a good faith conversation about what the value of those seat licenses are that we agreed to 40, 45 years ago and try to figure out a price.

To get those back to the university.

And then you've got others who said, no, this is the deal that I agreed to a long time ago.

I don't know why anybody thinks that would change.

And there are some who, you know, in that category are willing to go to court to let a judge make that decision.

So just across the 1,300, you know, account holders.

There's a wide array of opinions.

And that's really the challenge for university officials is, you know, do you sit and you talk with each and every member of that 1,300 base?

That's a lot of conversations. That's a lot of challenging conversations.

And if you renovate, you know, if everything that we've seen with renovation to the scale that they're talking would change the senior arrangement inside the bowl.

Well, if you went in and you picked, you know, seat five and roti.

And all of a sudden that is not in the same location with the renovation. What does that mean?

And I don't know that anybody knows.

And so Baba, coming to him.

He mentioned that he kind of thinks that vault is that if the seating configuration in the Smith Center were to change in a renovation.

Then the PSL process in terms of having seats in the building, that doesn't change.

And that continues.

But seat location would have to change.

And there's some that argue against that.

So it is a is a complicated situation.

I don't think there's any doubt that lawyers are going to be involved as they move forward.

And trying to figure out the best path forward is one of the big challenges here.

I think when you start talking about a new arena, that's probably the cleanest break.

But even then, I think you still will have some some lawsuits trying to figure out exactly what that forever phrase means.

It's a good place to end this one.

I have a feeling we'll still be talking about this for a while.

Maybe forever.

I mean, because to your point about this and all the reporting you've done, we've talked about how the Smith Center needs fixing.

Like yesterday.

And here we are debating this 45 year debate.

And also, if you get the courts involved as much as it sounds like it will be involved.

Who knows when all of this gets done.

So Greg, look forward to your reporting and your work and your articles basically forever.

It is a fascinating discussion.

And it is sort of like a microcosm of where we've come in the last 45 years about mom and pop handshake agreements.

Good old buddy stuff way back then.

And now what here we are when time comes to any up.

And everybody wants to remember 45 years ago.

I don't know how you do it.

I don't know how folks that are dealing with it do it.

But it certainly is certainly interesting to watch Greg.

I'm going to wrap it.

Let's get back together and talk about it again on Inside Carolina Daily.

That's Greg Barnes.

I'm Tommy.

I actually shut out the Johnny T shirt and Johnny T shirt.com.

And certainly go to Inside Carolina.

Sign up for the premium subscription, like this video, all the good stuff that you get from being a part of the community.

Thanks Greg.

Thanks Tommy.

Bringing your business dreams to life takes heart.

And about a thousand decisions a day.

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With the right guidance and customized solutions to help you reach your business goals.

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Yet small enough to know you.

Atlantic Union Bank.

Anyway, you bank.