Across the country, growing communities are creating and executing a variety of expansion projects, from schools to city parks and everywhere in between.

In Minnesota, most of those expansion projects carry a unique caveat: a new or updated ice arena to accommodate the growth of youth hockey, which generally mirrors the growth of the community.

From St. Michael-Albertville to Shakopee, these arena expansions are taking shape, and in Shakopee the two new sheets of ice aren’t the only part of the Community Center getting a facelift.

“First, I would clarify that the expansion is more than just the two new sheets of ice,” Shakopee Youth Hockey Mite Coach and on-ice coordinator Jason Peace said via email.

A Shakopee resident since 2004, Peace and his wife Katie have two boys in the Shakopee youth hockey program, and Jason is a member of the Shakopee Youth Baseball Association board.   

“That’s certainly the most important part for the Shakopee Youth Hockey Association, but it also updates the existing Community Center by expanding the fitness center, adding an indoor playground, senior center and child care center and meeting spaces,” Peace continued. “They are also working on a new aquatic facility,” Peace added.

“The Community Center has needed an expansion since it was built,” former Shakopee mayor Brad Tabke, a proponent of the project in his time as mayor from January of 2012 to January 2016. “It was under-built when it was originally put in in the 90s, and it was not built for a growing community at all."

Growing indeed.

Tabke says that over time it became clear that Shakopee would need to expand as a whole.

“It became fairly clear as Shakopee grew substantially through the late 90s and 2000s that showed Shakopee would double in size from 2000 to 2010,” Tabke explained.    

Shakopee High School has begun the process of expansion as well, with construction slated to be completed in the fall of 2018 and adding 335,000 square feet to the existing high school building.

The Community Center project will cost $30.4 million, with the new rinks costing between $16-18 million. According to Peace, the youth association has donated approximately $85,000 in scoreboards, synthetic ice and other amenities. 

Like most expansion processes, the Shakopee project edged its way through the City Council, with none of the council votes being decided by a wide margin.

“It certainly wasn’t unanimous within the city council as it passed three-to-two to move forward at each stage,” Peace said. “They were obviously concerned with how the community would react and how this was going to impact taxes.”

The concern over taxes was compounded by the passing of what is called a tax-abatement bond, which allows the city to pay the bonds with abated taxes.

“Some people were not happy that there wasn’t another referendum for it,” Tabke said, adding that initiative had to be taken for the project to be funded. “My theory was that as elected officials we are elected to lead and do these kinds of things.”

That initiative has allowed the youngest of Sabers to excel in the new space, with preferable ice times and more flexibility when it comes to development.

“I’ve been in the program for five years and I think having one sheet of ice made it difficult for everyone to get the ice time needed to fully develop as hockey players,” Peace said. “It’s the only major team sport where you have to actually learn how to move around on the playing surface let alone excel at it.”

With the Community Center expansion, new ice sheets and dryland training facility, the Shakopee programs are certainly poised to do just that.