Hartford Settles Litigation Over Dunkin' Park Debacle

City of Hartford

HARTFORD, CT — While the success of the Hartford Yard Goats and Dunkin' Park has proven to be a jolt to the psyche of the greater Hartford area, the journey there was rocky at best.

Last week, city officials announced a settlement between the city and the former developer of the ballpark, which actually opened a year behind schedule.

Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin last week announced that after more than seven years of litigation, the City of Hartford has reached a settlement agreement that will end litigation between the Centerplan/DoNo and the City of Hartford.

In 2016, the City terminated Dono/Centerplan from the baseball park construction project.

Dono/Centerplan filed suit seeking $90 million in damages.

After a lengthy legal process that included a unanimous jury verdict in favor of the City of Hartford and a reversal and remand by the State Supreme Court in 2022, a new jury trial would have begun in the Spring of 2024, likely with another lengthy appeals process to follow.

The City estimates that litigation, had it gone forward, would have cost the city between $5 million and $6 million, while potentially preventing development around the ballpark for many years.

As part of this agreement, the City of Hartford plans to authorize, pending approval of the Court of Common Council, a $9.9 million payment to Arch Insurance Co., which had paid $34 million in 2016 and 2017 to finish the baseball stadium.

As part of the agreement, Arch will make a payment of $1.8 million to DoNo/Centerplan.

Because the city reserved sufficient funds for the settlement from its prior year's surplus, the settlement will have no impact on the FY 2024 budget or require the City to draw down any funds from its unassigned fund balance.

“While I remain confident that the City would have prevailed again at another trial, and while I wish the 2019 jury verdict had ended the matter for good, the litigation would have cost many more millions of dollars in legal fees, would have left the city with ongoing risk, and could have prevented development from moving forward for many years," said Bronin.

"This settlement is the responsible thing to do for Hartford, and it’s a clear validation of our decision to terminate Centerplan and call the bond in 2016, because it resolves this litigation for a fraction of what Arch Insurance Company paid to finish the ballpark.”

The settlement agreement means that the city can move forward immediately with the development of the parcels around Dunkin' Park that had been frozen by litigation.

"The development around the ballpark will generate tax revenue for the City, reconnect neighborhoods that have long been kept apart by I-84 and the sea of surface parking lots, maintain our economic development momentum, and add hundreds of units of housing as part of the broader mixed-use development," said Bronin.

This press release was produced by the City of Hartford. The views expressed here are the author’s own.