SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON BASEBALL/CIVIC CENTER
May 5, 2026 at 5:30 PM
Chairman O'Neil called the meeting to order.
The Clerk called the roll.
Present: Aldermen O'Neil, Barry, Goonan, Vincent, Dexter
Messrs.: E. Sweeney
1. Discussion with Erin Sweeney, SNHU Arena General Manager.
Chairman O'Neil: We have a nice agenda tonight. It's more of just an introduction as we're going through some changes at SNHU arena with our management company. I'd first like to welcome up Erin Sweeney, our new general manager as of a month ago.
Erin Sweeney, SNHU Arena General Manager: I've been here about four weeks. Really excited to be a part of the community. Manchester is a beautiful place. Really excited to be a part of the SNHU arena and its impact on the community here. It's a beautiful downtown. I've been doing this for about 17 years, and I actually am a native of the state of New Hampshire, so it's a homecoming for me back to New Hampshire, and I'm excited to be here. I did bring some of our members of our team.
Chairman O'Neil: I was going to just introduce in no order, but Brett Steffenson, who's the Regional Vice President from Legends, happens to be here. Welcome, Brett. He's here to take a tour of the building and see the city. I was just going to recognize your leadership team if I can. Dave Everett is the Director of Operations. He keeps the place running, keeps the lights on and clean and all that. So, thank you, Dave. Al Foley is the Director of Food and Beverage. Doesn't matter what they're serving, it's great. Caitlin Mackey is the Director of Finance, and I think Caitlin was coming in during the transition period, too. But she's already met with her, and they met with Sharon and Mish at the Finance Department who are an important link. Maddie Griffin, Director of Marketing for the arena, and Mike Donahue, Director of Security and whatever else he's needed to do there. He is a friend to many of us as he served the city for many years as a police officer.
Alderman Dexter: I know how he was trained. So, he was trained very well.
Chairman O'Neil: I just want to recognize your team because it was an interim period where Tim had retired and before you came on, Lynn was here, but they carried the ball and the building was active. There were a lot of big events going on. A lot of the community events were going on in that period with the CHad hockey game and the high school hockey tournament, which is huge. They come from all over the state if their team is playing. I just want to give on behalf of the city of Manchester and our citizens, a thank you to the leadership team, because you guys did a great job keeping the place going in that interim period. So, thank you very, very much. I'd be remiss if I didn't thank Tim Beckert, who was with us for 23 years. He came here while the building was under construction and has stayed. I had the chance to meet Erin and we talked about, along with Alderman Barry, the general manager needs to be involved in the community, and Tim was very active in the community. And so, it was more just an introduction and a thank you to the great team that keeps that place active. Keep bringing in quality acts. And believe it or not, Erin and I were talking yesterday about monster trucks. Are there any questions from the committee? It was more just to give us a chance to say thank you to all of them and welcome some of our new folks here.
Alderman Barry: Congratulations, Erin, and thank you. Which direction are we going? I say we because we're partners. In the future, some people are talking about bringing hockey back. I know it's very difficult and we've discussed it prior. Especially if you're dealing with the CHL. But concerts, those are going to continue as we've always enjoyed?
E. Sweeney: Yes, absolutely. I'll address hockey first. It's definitely something we can explore. I don't know if you know or do not know, but the AHL team in Bridgeport is relocating to Canada, to give you a scope of New England and AHL hockey. I know it's important; everyone was a fan of AHL hockey, and that's something we can definitely explore. No guarantees because that landscape is ever changing. I know hockey is important to this community. I know that every few years it was something that was looked at and that's on the agenda to relook at and assess the feasibility if we can support a team here and what that looks like for interested parties coming into the scope of the SNHU arena. As far as the concert landscape, we've already started. I've started out bounding to my contacts in the booking community nationally. I was fortunate enough to come here with some national contacts across promoters and agents. And so, we've already started out bounding. I'll give you a little sneak peek. We do have a couple announcements coming up here in the next month or so of some content coming up in the next few months. So that's exciting. We are working on the fall calendar and then obviously 2027. So really excited for the opportunity here. Everyone I talked to from agents to promoters is really excited about the versatility of the SNHU arena. So, excited to welcome some people back and then continue existing relationships with local promoters and agents.
Chairman O'Neil: I told Erin there wouldn't be any trick questions. And of course, you asked one.
Alderman Barry: Andy Sylvia is over here. He's a reporter with the Manchester Ink Link. Great guy, good source. Keep him in mind.
E. Sweeney: Will do.
Chairman O'Neil: But you do have monster truck coming in this weekend?
E. Sweeney: We do. We have Monster Jam this weekend, Saturday and Sunday. It's doing really well. We still have a few more tickets open for those that are interested.
Chairman O'Neil: I went last year and it wasn't really busy, but that's great. And you just hosted how many days of SNHU graduation?
E. Sweeney: We hosted three days of SNHU graduation. It was great. We had five commencements across last weekend and then the following weekend after Monster Jam, we have an MMA fight combat zone.
Chairman O'Neil: And then high school graduations will start, which are very popular not only with Manchester high schools, but with many of our regional schools.
E. Sweeney: And we do have Journey coming as well.
Alderman Barry: Phish was a great success here. Hopefully if you could pull some strings, get something like that again, because that worked out so well. And we got so many compliments from around the country of how well people were treated when they came here. We closed off the street, which we don't normally do. So that was great. The police chief says he enjoyed it.
Chairman O'Neil: The chief enjoyed all three days of Phish.
Alderman Barry: He even dressed like them.
E. Sweeney: Anytime you can get the stars in line like that and get a group like Phish in the building, you know you hit home run. So hopefully we can hit another home run with something else. Content wise, I can't guarantee it's Phish. We'll try. But those are the things that are great where the stars align and it works out.
Chairman O'Neil: And that's a credit to the to the folks, not only your leadership team, but all the employees full time and part time, that they made it such a good experience for Phish. They wanted to open up here three days and it was $1.5 million put into the local economy, something like that. Even more maybe. So, it's important. So again, the staff, your team, and all the folks that work with you, thank you to everyone for doing a great job. We'll make sure that we get Erin's contact info to everyone.
There being no further business, on motion of Alderman Barry, duly seconded by Alderman Goonan, it was voted to adjourn.
A True Record. Attest.
Clerk of Committee
Meeting Start Time: 5:30PM
Meeting End Time: 5:39PM
Minutes Prepared By: Michael Intranuovo