WINTER HAVEN -- A lot of things can be said about the Dome, but "hot!" is no longer one of them.
With $60,000 worth of air conditioning almost completely installed, the Cypress Gardens Boulevard landmark can now withstand Florida's muggy springs and sweltering summers.
And a comfortably cool Dome means nice revenues for the city.
"The more you fix it up, the more money you're gonna get out of it," interim City Manager Dale Smith said Thursday.
The city has already spent about $200,000 in renovations for the Dome in just the last few months -- Chief Wahoo and the baseball stripes were painted over in favor of traditional orange, the bathrooms have been upgraded to fix code violations, palm trees are planted outside, and now cool air is circulating throughout the facility.
The renovations may have saved the 37-year-old building, since it had fallen into disrepair in recent years and was becoming unrentable during the hotter months.
"So we could start renting it for weekend events, expos, things like that," said interim City Manager Dale Smith, "we needed to do the air conditioning, the doors, the bathrooms."
To pay for most of those renovations, the city loaned itself the money, which will be repaid from Dome rental revenue.
Leisure Services Director Bob Sheffield said that if the facility brings in as much rental money as the $15,000 it did in March, it won't be long before that in-house loan is paid back.
Sheffield has even more ideas on how to further fix up the building, and intends to present city commissioners with a master plan at the next meeting April 23. That master plan will include possible uses for the building and projected revenue from rentals. It will also likely have a list of work Sheffield said should be done to the building.
"There's still a lot that needs to be done if you want to go crazy," he said.
That interior work entails renovating the office space and concession stands and improving the interior lighting. It also suggests eliminating one of the big problems that Sheffield and Smith both agree needs to be addressed -- poor acoustics.
"The problem is that concrete floor is so hard, (noise) just bounces right off there," Sheffield said.
Rubber flooring is probably the best solution for the echo problem, and it would also allow the building to be used for sports. That rubber flooring could cost $200,000, Sheffield said, but it would virtually eliminate the acoustic problems.
