PORTLAND, Maine — Trustees for the newly named Cross Insurance Arena have decided to outsource management of the former Cumberland County Civic Center to Global Spectrum, the Philadelphia-based entertainment venue manager that oversees Bangor’s Cross Insurance Center.
The trustees for the Cross Insurance Arena voted Friday to begin negotiating a contract with Global Spectrum to take over management of the facility.
Neal Pratt, chairman of the arena’s board of directors, said there’s no specific timeline for Global Spectrum to step in but he expects the two parties will come to a final agreement by the end of the year.
“There’s no fixed timeline, but both parties are anxious to finalize the details,” Pratt said.
With the transition, there’s some uncertainty around how many of the county-managed arena’s employees will continue working at the arena under the new management. Roberta Wright, the arena’s event services manager, said the arena has 11 full-time and 409 part-time employees. Pratt said the arena’s long-time general manager recently retired and an interim director is on board through the transition to private management, which will involve hiring for that position permanently.
Pratt said the trustees selected Global Spectrum because competing bidder SMG also manages the Verizon Wireless Arena in Manchester, New Hampshire, a market he said has more overlap with Portland than Bangor has with Portland.
“We felt the distinctions between the Portland and Bangor markets were greater than the Portland and Manchester markets,” Pratt said.
Portland and Manchester both host American Hockey League franchises.
Pratt said that each facility would be operated separately by largely independent general managers but that having the same company operating both the Bangor and Portland arena could have benefits.
“There are certainly synergies there that we hope to take advantage of,” Pratt said. “We’re certainly hoping [the Portland and Bangor arenas] can benefit from each other rather than compete with each other.”
Global Spectrum is also a sister company of Front Row Marketing, the firm in charge of promoting both arenas and handling commercial rights and premium seating sales. The company oversees more than 125 arenas, stadiums and convention centers and generates more than $699 million in annual revenue, a reach that Pratt said the Portland arena’s trustees hope will open up more entertainment options.