Lamar-Dixon signs up Coke as first sponsor
GONZALES — The Lamar-Dixon Expo Center has its first corporate sponsorship, a deal Ascension Parish President Tommy Martinez had hoped would materialize when the parish decided to buy the center in 2009 and make it more financially supporting.
The Ascension Parish Council backed the first sponsorship deal in early January with Coca-Cola Bottling Co. The deal, to run 4 years and 5 months, is worth as much as $106,250 to the center, or about $25,000 annually in cash and in-kind payments.
It included prorated payments for five months of 2011 and an option to renew for another three years.
The center also will be loaned Coca-Cola refrigeration coolers and dispensing equipment.
In exchange, the parish has agreed to give Coca-Cola exclusivity for advertising, placement on the center’s permanent signs and beverages sold at the center on La. 30.
Martinez said expo center officials are seeking other sponsors, including cable and Internet provider Cox Communications Inc., adding “Cox is very interested right now.”
The public affairs manager for Cox, Sharon Souther Bethea, confirmed last week that discussions just began with Ascension Parish officials but said she did not have details to share because the conversation with the parish is still early.
“We are always looking for opportunities for community investments, especially ones which support cornerstone initiatives such as economic development,” Bethea said in an email.
In 2011, the parish budgeted $260,000 in sponsorships and donations for Lamar-Dixon but took in $40,000, according to budget documents. Overall, the center is projected to end 2011 with a $206,500 surplus and push its fund balance to more than $1 million.
Sponsorship deals, with the exception of a four-year, $100,000 donation dating from 2009 by Southland Fire and Safety Equipment President and CEO Nicky Prejean, have been a slower coming than expected as the parish ran into legal questions about the sponsorships, Martinez and other officials have said.
When Lamar-Dixon was under lease to the parish, the center was operated under contract by SMG, which also operates the Baton Rouge River Center and the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. SMG had the ability as a private entity to seek corporate sponsorships.
The parish dropped SMG shortly after it agreed to buy Lamar-Dixon and manage the center directly.
In August, legislation took effect giving the parish the power to seek sponsorships for Lamar-Dixon.
State Sen. Jody Amedee, R-Gonzales, was the sponsor of Senate Bill 157, which granted the parish the authority to seek corporate sponsorships for Lamar-Dixon.
He said parish officials asked him for the bill after being informed by the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office of the need for such authority.
A spokeswoman for the state Attorney General’s Office, Amanda Larkins, pointed to a 2006 opinion on the sale of naming rights by a school board.
The opinion said there are no laws specifically allowing or prohibiting the sale of naming rights and concluded a school board could sell naming rights.
Such a sale includes an intangible public asset and the opinion recommended legislation defining the process of such a sale.