Ballpark Developer Suing City of Hartford

The developer who was fired from building Hartford's ballpark is suing the city, according to a complaint filed.

In June, the mayor of Hartford announced that the city will terminate its agreement with the developer, Centerplan, from the Dunkin' Donuts stadium project.

Centerplan said it is looking for an injunction against the city because it did not use the proper dispute resolution channels laid out in their joint agreement before the city fired them, the complaint claims.

The City of Hartford last week started the process of moving forward on the stadium project and the possibility of acting as the developer. Mayor Luke Bronin called the bond on the project, activating a more than $40 million insurance policy meant to guarantee the completion of the stadium.

At the beginning of July, the owner of Centerplan, Bob Landino, said he was in the process of developing a multimillion dollar agreement to complete the stadium without adding extra costs for the city. The stadium was projected to cost $56 million but that figure has since spiked to more than $66 million.

However, Bronin said he had yet to see a "serious" proposal from the developer. 

Centerplan started construction on the stadium in February 2015 with a set completion date of mid-March. After delays came to light in December 2015, a new date of May 17 was set in January. Centerplan did not meet that date, the city invoked the $46 million insurance policy on the project and the city later fired Centerplan.

The Yard Goats baseball team have been playing all of the scheduled home games on the road since the beginning of the season. 

Bronin told NBC Connecticut: 

"Last week DoNo LLC went after headlines with a fake offer to pay for the stadium's completion, this week they're filing a lawsuit to obstruct its completion. While we deal with this latest action from DoNo LLC, we remain focused on working productively with the surety, Arch Insurance, to ensure that a responsible, capable partner takes control of the project."

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