Blanco Administration Backing Practice Center For Hornets

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) _ Governor Kathleen Blanco is backing $14.5 million in state funding to build a new training facility for the New Orleans Hornets. <br/><br/>The dollars for the practice center were

Thursday, September 13th 2007, 8:14 pm

By: News On 6

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) _ Governor Kathleen Blanco is backing $14.5 million in state funding to build a new training facility for the New Orleans Hornets.

The dollars for the practice center were included in the Blanco administration recommendations for construction project funding submitted today to the State Bond Commission, which will vote next week on whether to approve the list.

Under the plan proposed by Blanco, the state would spend $1.5 million this year and the rest in later years.

The state agreed to build a new practice facility -- and the city set aside more than $6 million to help pay for it -- when the Hornets moved to New Orleans from Charlotte, North Carolina, in 2002.

Construction was delayed for a variety of reasons, including team owner George Shinn's change of mind regarding his preferred site for the building. Initially he settled on a site in eastern New Orleans. Later he asked that the facility be built on state-owned land next to the New Orleans Arena.

State officials and Shinn reached a compromose by proposing to attach the practice center to the arena by building it above an existing loading dock.

The new facility could cost as much as $20 million.

In the meantime, the Hornets are practicing rent-free in the state-owned Alario Center in suburban Westwego. That's where they also practiced for their first three seasons in New Orleans before being temporarily displaced to Oklahoma City by Hurricane Katrina before the 2005-06 season.