As an architecture student, Foutch Brothers owner Steve Foutch studied Kemper Arena in Kansas City as one of his first projects. Today, thanks to Foutch's efforts, the building has been saved and transformed into Hy-Vee Arena and serves as both an architectural masterpiece and a hub for youth sports.
After a five-year political battle and a $42 million renovation, Kemper Arena has been transformed into Hy-Vee Arena. Above images courtesy of Foutch Brothers, LLC.
"My wife and I really wanted to make a difference with youth sports and save the arena," he said at a recent CCIM Kansas City breakfast.
Foutch's mission to save the arena stemmed from a desire to prevent it from being demolished to create space for the American Royal's barbecue competition.
The quest to acquire Kemper Arena from the City of Kansas City, Missouri involved a five-year political battle and expenditure of approximately $500,000 in architecture, engineering, legal and lobbying fees before the city council finally approved the sale, he said.
Foutch acquired the arena in 2017 for one dollar and quickly learned that “things that are free are not free.” Foutch and his partners spent $42 million to renovate the arena, which currently is on the National Register of Historic Places. Their five-year compliance period will end in October.
“Then we can do whatever we want with the building after that,” Foutch said.
The arena currently features 12 hardwood basketball courts located on two of the four floors. One of those floors is a floating floor that goes all the way down to the bedrock but does not touch the original building or attach to it in any way, with a five-inch gap around it for vibration.
The arena boasts a top floor housing a 350-meter, five-lane running track, as well as retail and office space. Additionally, the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association (MIAA) and KC Crew have set up their headquarters within the arena.
According to Foutch, banking and legal problems hampered the project at the beginning. Foutch’s group and its general contractor, McCownGordon Construction, came out of pocket to keep the project going “before the bank was able to jump back in.”
The day Hy-Vee Arena opened, there was a five-inch rain, and the floor drains became geysers. Foutch said the city turned on the Turkey Creek pumping station but failed to open the gates.
“Five hours of scooping up brown stuff . . . before it hits the courts,” he said.
Nonetheless, the arena had a strong start. But, Foutch said it has been plagued by a myriad of challenges, with one of the biggest being parking.
The parking lot is still city-owned. Hy-Vee Arena has a right to use it, except when the city wants to use it, and except for 25 days a year allotted to the American Royal. According to Foutch, the American Royal has taken one Saturday of each week for 25 weeks.
“So it’s really hard to plan two or three years in advance when you don’t know what those dates are going to be. . . . I run a tournament Friday, Saturday and Sunday. They took every Saturday, so I don’t have parking on Saturday. I really can’t have a three-day tournament without parking,” he said.
Foutch said they wired the entire arena for ShotTracker, a sensor-based system that delivers statistics and analytics instantly. They soon discovered that the software didn’t work on adjacent courts because the tracking beams interfered with each other. Consequently, the software can be used on only one court, posing an issue for national tournaments hoping to use the system on all 12 courts.
Foutch wanted to use the arena as a concert venue, but the city has a non-compete agreement with T-Mobile Center (formerly Sprint Center), preventing Hy-Vee Arena concerts from having more than 2,500 seats. Foutch said he hopes to resolve that issue. In the meantime, he has a noncompete agreement covering the entire American Royal Center property.
“The City and whatever happens there cannot do anything that I do ever. So if I have office space, if I have retail, if I have this, this and this, whatever I do in that building, nothing else on that land around me can do it,” he said.
The biggest challenge, however, was COVID, which shut down operations in the arena completely, after the health department locked the arena’s doors.
Not only did the arena lose all the scheduled tournaments to venues in other locations like Wichita and Denver, but Foutch’s group did not qualify for a Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan or for a Shuttered Venue Operators Grant.
“We’re about $5 million in the hole just from COVID losses alone. So we’re doing all we can. We’re coming back and we’ll make it, but that was difficult,” he said.
Foutch is optimistic about the future of Hy-Vee Arena. Zip KC plans to install four zip lines off the arena’s roof that will span the Kansas River. There also will be opportunities to climb the frame of the building (“like a ropes course”) to reach the zip lines or to experience a harnessed 100-foot vertical drop.
Foutch said there are plans also for miniature golf and movies projected on the outside of the building.
He hopes someday to access the acreage behind the arena. But, more immediately, he is seeking ways to promote the use of the building all day long. Currently, on weekdays, the arena sits empty until about 4:30 or 5:00 pm when the club teams arrive.
Foutch is searching for some corporate events to fill the space during the days. He also wants to institute an afterschool program to offer classes and opportunities that area children don’t get in their regular schools. And, with several apartment units being built near the arena, Foutch envisions residents using the building during the day for adult recreation activities.
“Looking back, I wish I would not have done this project. . . . Looking forward though, I’m going to love it. I think in another 5, 6, 7 years, this will actually turn out to be what we thought it was going to be,” he said.
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FEATURE IMAGES COURTESY OF FOUTCH BROTHERS, LLC