When plans for a $4 million sports complex on The Fly fell apart last month, activists claimed it as a victory for people power.
Armed with little more than social media and bumper stickers, Save The Fly managed to stop a project backed by Saints owner Tom Benson and his star quarterback, Drew Brees.
At least that’s how it probably appeared to the public.
Behind the scenes, a power struggle was playing out between Louisiana Fire, a competitive soccer “super club” that spans two parishes, and Carrollton Boosters, the dominant private organizer of youth sports Uptown.
In public, the soccer complex was the dispute. In private, it had become caught up in a larger contest to determine who controls soccer on The Fly, some of the most coveted sports real estate in the city.
The conflict has been no less rancorous for its having simmered largely behind the scenes, as divergent missions, geography and a whiff of class conflict stoke the flames.
Both groups continue to tread lightly when it comes to discussing the dispute in public, as the question of who will run the show going forward is still very much unresolved.
Carrollton Boosters declined to give their account of the how the soccer complex negotiations unfolded, but directors of Louisiana Fire agreed to discuss the matter, saying they wished to clear up misconceptions that have been circling in the soccer community since the project became a political lightning rod.
The seeds
Before the recent tension, Louisiana Fire and Carrollton Boosters coexisted peacefully, even cooperated to some degree on logistical issues at The Fly, where they both have youth soccer operations. It remains common for kids to play in recreational games with Carrollton Boosters and competitive leagues with the Fire.
Between them, they run soccer programming for about 2,500 players at Audubon Park.
Their history together dates back to the late 1990s, when Louisiana Fire’s predecessor organization, the Carrollton Soccer Association, was spun off from Carrollton Boosters to provide a supplemental recreation league and a competitive club for Uptown soccer players.
In 2010, though, Carrollton Soccer joined with other clubs in Jefferson Parish and Lakeview to form Louisiana Fire, a super club that runs competitive soccer and recreation leagues in parks across the metro area. The move included an expansion of recreational offerings on The Fly, where the Soccer Association had a long-term agreement with the Audubon Commission granting the club management rights over soccer fields in the park.
Carrollton Boosters saw the move as a betrayal, as Carrollton Soccer had originally agreed to offer its recreation league only during the spring, Carrllton Boosters’ offseason.
By then, though, the two organizations had already grown apart.
Both groups command annual budgets of $1 million or more, fed by thousands of participating families, but Louisiana Fire operates competitive teams trained by professional, paid coaches. In 2013, Fire staff earned a combined $300,000 in salaries, according to tax filings.
Carrollton Boosters, on the other hand, relies almost entirely on volunteers, pumping its revenue into the maintenance of its baseball fields in Audubon Park. Soccer for the Boosters is purely a recreational endeavor, though they do have an affiliation with New Orleans Jesters, a competitive club.
The composition of the organizations’ boards contrast as much as their missions.
Members of Louisiana Fire’s board are, almost uniformly, residents of suburban Jefferson Parish. The Carrollton Boosters board, on the other hand, is comprised of a who’s who of the Uptown business and political class. The current president is the granddaughter of a New Orleans mayor, and its previous two leaders are an investment banker and hospital executive.
One Carrollton Boosters board member, who was involved in negotiations with Louisiana Fire over the soccer complex, sits on the Audubon Commission, though he recused himself from the vote granting boosters authority to proceed with the project.
Power shifts
In 2013, Louisiana Fire sought to renew its “act of donation” with the Audubon Commission, the legal document that gave the club authority over management of the soccer fields on The Fly.
The Audubon Commission declined through a spokeswoman to elaborate on its relationship with Louisiana Fire, but the club’s leadership said it was told in no uncertain terms to make peace with Carrollton Boosters.
“We were told that, if we wanted to renew our agreement, we had to work with the boosters,” said Dante Maraldo, president of Louisiana Fire. “We were fine with that. We thought there was room for everyone.”
Enter the soccer complex.
Louisiana Fire had for years been raising money to add another field on the fly and to build a pavilion to serve as a shelter and home base during tournaments. As of 2013, it still didn’t have quite enough money to proceed, Maraldo said.
Meanwhile, a board member at the Audubon Nature Institute, the commission’s private nonprofit partner, was also formulating a plan to expand soccer facilities Uptown.
Seeing an opportunity for mutually beneficial cooperation, the board member, John Payne, coordinated a three-way fundraising effort between himself, Carrollton Boosters and Louisiana Fire.
Payne declined to comment for this article, but Maraldo said the relationship between the club and Carrollton Boosters fell apart during the fundraising process in 2014.
Louisiana Fire had $500,000 of the $1.2 million it needed to hold up its end of the bargain, Maraldo said. A bank was prepared to front the remaining $700,000, but only if the club had a long-term agreement for use of the fields, he said.
By this time, Audubon had made it clear that it wanted management of its sports facilities on The Fly to be under one roof – Carrollton Boosters’, Maraldo said. With only three years remaining on Louisiana Fire’s agreement with Audubon, the club needed the boosters to grant what amounted to a long-term sublease in order to get the loan.
Rather than being asked to accommodate Carrollton Boosters, Louisiana Fire found itself asking for the accommodation, Maraldo said. “We were negotiating for our existence at The Fly,” he said.
For whatever reason — Louisiana Fire says the boosters wouldn’t agree to reasonable terms — they didn’t strike a deal, and the club was sidelined in the planning of the complex’s development.
Momentum shift
Then, in February, the momentum in negotiations abruptly changed hands again. Protestors got wind that the complex was to be built on a prime piece of green space and mounted a withering social media campaign to stop it.
Audubon and Carrollton Boosters, caught off guard by the backlash, agreed to pause the project while they discussed a compromise with some of the park advocates.
Louisiana Fire, which had remained silent during the furor, suddenly found its bargaining position improved. With the complex under attack, Carrollton Boosters had an incentive to bring their erstwhile rivals into the fold to shore up support.
The two sides came to an agreement, Maraldo said. The club would not have a contractual right to use the soccer complex’s turf field, but Carrollton Boosters would guarantee the Louisiana Fire use of the grass fields for the duration of its agreement with Audubon.
In exchange, Louisiana Fire agreed to kill its recreation league at The Fly and to limit its development program, among other concessions.
Despite that agreement, Louisiana Fire was left out of Carrollton Boosters negotiations with the park activists, Maraldo said, and it showed in the compromise agreement they fashioned.
Rather than building the new, artificial turf field on passive green space, thereby adding an additional soccer field to the existing two grass fields, the compromise plan would have built it on top of one of the two large grass fields, which were critical to Louisiana Fire’s ability to train competitive players.
Louisiana Fire cried foul.
“We tried to explain that they had already gutted our rec program and our (development program),” Maraldo said. “Now they were proposing to take away one of our fields.”
A hardline faction of park advocates also bucked, saying no development on The Fly was preferable.
The plans, once leaked to the media, sounded the complex’s death knell. Seeing no way to accommodate everyone, Payne pulled his support, and Carrollton Boosters followed suit.
When the complex died, Carrollton Boosters’ contract to manage the soccer fields went with it, leaving the future of soccer on The Fly in question.
Louisiana Fire will retain control until 2017, but a spokeswoman for Audubon declined to say who will manage the fields going forward.
Storey Charbonnet, a past president of Carrollton Boosters and the group’s point man for negotiations with Louisiana Fire, declined to discuss the matter on the record but issued this statement:
“Yes, there will be soccer on the Fly for years to come. Yes, Carrollton will continue to serve the children of the city in many different sports. Yes, we will continue to provide any child an opportunity, whether they can afford it or not, through our scholarship program. Yes, we will continue to work with any group looking for field space to play”.
Representatives of Louisiana Fire said they will continue to work with Carrollton Boosters and Audubon in order to continue to develop young soccer players on The Fly.
