Some highlights from Finley Stadium’s operations from July through September 2024 were noted at the stadium corporation’s October meeting. Improvements continue to be made at the facility, including the conversion of field lighting to LED. The work is still in progress; however, the lighting is usable now. The energy saving lights are paying off. An application that was made for a rebate from TVA to change to LED bulbs was originally projected to be $40,000 based on the estimated usage. That number has been significantly improved with the rebate now being $150,000.
The city of Chattanooga will be adding an access gate to the skate park. The skate park is owned by the city but the parking lot for that park is Finley Stadium’s property and responsibility. The new gate will allow the parking lot to be closed off between midnight and 6 a.m. This is expected to stop bad actors and reduce vandalism, said Brian Wright, executive director of Finley Stadium.
The long-planned elevator repairs will be ready to start after the last football game. The equipment and materials are in, said Board Chairman Mike Davis.
On the event side of the facility, the Bands of America Regional Championship held on Oct. 5 was the highest grossing event of the year. It brought 25 high school bands to Finley Stadium from around the Southeast and beyond, also giving tourism in Chattanooga a boost. Octoberfest filled the Pavilion on Oct. 13, and there have been two UTC football games. The University of Alabama’s Million Dollar Band will do a stop-over concert at Finley Stadium on Friday and the University of Tennessee’s Pride of the Southland marching band will perform two concerts on Nov. 15 as they travel through Chattanooga on the way to the Georgia game in Athens.
The highest revenue event at the First Horizon Pavilion in 2023 was the opening night party in the Pavilion, for The Future of Freight Festival held by local company FreightWaves. Because of budget cuts throughout the freight industry, that event was moved to another location unexpectedly.
The investment in remodeling The Ultra Club has been successful. In a single week in November four events in three days are scheduled to take place there.
Ice on the Landing in the Pavilion will begin earlier this year than last. It is opening on Nov. 17, during the Thanksgiving Market.
The staff at Finley Stadium was praised for handling an emergency situation that was the result of Hurricane Helene. The stadium field was affected by the heavy rain the day before UTC was scheduled to play Portland State. On Sept. 27, stormwater was rerouted from different areas of Chattanooga and ended up in the water storage tanks that are buried under the front parking lot of the stadium. Once these tanks filled up, water found its way to the lowest spots and ended up on the field. And when the field flooded so did the locker rooms. The staff did an amazing job to get ready for the game on following day, said Mr. Wright. They had drained the field by 12:30 and worked through the night cleaning up the locker rooms. The city’s public works department jumped on it too, he said. Now the city is aware of what to look for and has a plan for handling water during extreme rain in the future. Because of the synthetic turf, the game was played as usual.