Audio Transcription is edited for content.

Mike Eves: It’s X 1 0 1. Always classic. I am Mike Eves with Spring here. We thought we’d bring in the Cortland Regional Sports Council Director, Executive Director, Michelle Phelps. Michelle, how are you? And, welcome into the studios. I know you guys are gearing up for a busy spring and summer. Right?

Machell Phillips: I’m great. Thank you. And thanks for having us. We appreciate it.

Mike Eves: Yeah, yeah. No, of course. Now, before we get to some of the events and some of the economic impact, if you wanna just kind of give us a brief, a background on the Regional Sports Council. it’s been around for quite a long time, and you really, you guys have been and brought some great athletic events to Cortland County.

Machell Phillips: We have it, it’s been 20 years and that’s kind of hard to believe. But we started out as a result of hosting, the Empire State Games with Syracuse back in 2002. And in 2004, the Sports Council was formed. And since then, it’s basically been my job to bring sporting events into the community strictly for the economic impact.

Mike Eves: That’s right. And it’s been great to see too, where the number of, you know, sporting venues has increased. Obviously we could talk about the opening of the SUNY Cortland Athletic Complex, the stadium there. I think that was in the mid two thousands. All the high schools really have right, gotten turf fields and you know, this is before even Gutchess Lumber Sports Complex has.

Mike Eves: Has been built too, which is one of your, your guys’ big drivers. But, before we kind of get into those things, I know, you know, on the summer day, you know, you do see a bit of traffic in things and, and restaurants are full and, and it’s pretty good and it’s all a result of the court and regional sports council.

Mike Eves: Yeah. Let’s talk about some of the economic impact. I mean, some of the numbers you’re talking about it, it is pretty amazing since Covid.

Machell Phillips: It. It is. And you know, when we first started this, we were happy to hit a million dollars and that happened after a couple of years. But since then, you know, we experienced COVID, we barely hit a million dollars in 2020. the only thing we could do during that time for those couple of years actually was outdoor events. But since then, and then with the impact this past year, we actually hit, a little over $11 million.

Mike Eves: Wow. $11 million in economic impact. And, of course, what are some of the ways that you guys can kind of gauge that and things?

Mike Eves: Do you guys have some different data and some reference points right? To, to get to that number?

Machell Phillips: We do. So every year we get an update from the New York State Department of Economic Development. They give me the average spending in upstate New York for a day trip and an overnight trip. So that’s our multiplier.

Machell Phillips: And then we take into consideration. the teams that come here, the overnight stays that I know that I’ve booked based on tournaments and things.

Mike Eves: Yeah. Yeah. So is it an exact science? No. But it’s pretty darn close, and I’m sure the county and Cortlandville will tell you, Hey, look at our, in our, our taxes have gone up and all these goods that we’ve sold from things in Walmart to gasoline to the hotel taxes.

Machell PhillipsThere’s lots of numbers we can look at. The occupancy tax, the sales tax, all those things. You can see, uh, a definite. Increase and, and we were talking, you know, you go to ask any restaurateur or gas station person or even, you know, in, in the, in the grocery stores, you ask them, is it really busy on these weeks for these tournaments?

Mike Eves: And they’re gonna say, oh yeah, it’s some of our [busiest times of the year. We’ve talked about, you know, Walmart’s even run outta water. You know, you, you, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s pretty amazing to see when you see, you know, $11 million. It’s pretty amazing. And there’s so many different events.

Mike Eves: Let’s kind of talk about some of that. Yeah, I know we’ve had lots of high school events. The senior games have been great the past few years, and then we’ll get into some of the baseball events too at Gutches Slumber Sports Complex. But of course, one of the big ones is, has been the senior games.

Mike Eves: Cortland really has kind of become the home of the senior games. Right?

Machell Phillips: Right, So in 2011. New York State disbanded the department that used to handle the senior games, the Empire State Games, physically challenged in the winter games. And so they came to us and said, Hey, do you wanna take this over? And of course, me not knowing everything that’s involved, I said, sure. We’ll we’ll do it. Yeah. So it’s, it’s definitely been a learning experience, but I think we’ve got it down and, , yeah. You know, last year we welcomed over 1600 athletes here from all over the state. And that all over that was for the senior games and had a number of sports too.

Mike Eves: It was, yeah. You know, and you’re using, what’s great too is you’re using facilities that sometimes otherwise, you know, after Cortland leaves that facility’s just sitting there. We’re kind of reusing things and obviously the college loves to see it as well.

Machell Phillips: Yeah. I mean, we have things like badminton, archery. Cards we even added that we have bowling, track and field. You know, and of course. The biggest thing is pickleball.

Mike Eves: Yep. Pickle ball’s been really big. Yeah. If you ask my dad here, John Eves, he’ll tell you pickleball is, is a huge thing. And that, that’s a sport that’s kind of blown up nationally here in the last five years really. So it’s really kind of, it’s, it’s awesome to see that, you know, and having Cortland become, it’s like home turf where it’s, it’s, it’s been a lot of fun. And, and, and the other event that you guys really have kind of done is having some of the sectional and some of the championships, you know, where we’re getting, we’re getting high school teams at all the different divisions coming here to Cortland to use our facilities. And it doesn’t hurt, you know, or I mean, it helps that we are essentially located too.

Machell Phillips: Exactly, and so we host three state championships right now. Mm-hmm. And then. The semi-finals for boys lacrosse plus two sectional championships. Oh, wow. Girls lacrosse and girls soccer. So I think, , I’d have to double check this, but I’m pretty sure Yeah/ Our area hosts the most New York State Public High School Athletic Association events.

Mike Eves: And those are, those are pretty big draws. You know, if you’ve ever had a family member and, you know, they, they bring in the whole family, the immediate family, the grandparents, you know, everybody’s coming to, coming to check it out. And we, we have the facilities, Michelle, and, you know, we’ve got the restaurants and the grocery stores, and a lot of times this is in a, you know, at the end of the school, you know, and even coming into the summer, it’s not too really much of a busy time for our local economy.

Machell Phillips: Right. I think it shoulders nice with the college leaving and, you know.

Machell Phillips: The facilities are opened up a little bit. Yeah. You know, one of the things that, that we bid on and, and we won was the Flag Football Championships. And if you notice all the NFL advertising for that mm-hmm. During the games and during the Super Bowl, it’s becoming a big deal. Yeah. And so for us to say that, first of all, we host the, the first Yeah.

Machell Phillips: State championship for flag football and we’re gonna do it for another two years.

Mike Eves: Yeah. That that’s great. Pretty cool. You know, and that’s the other thing too, is I think some of these tournaments are in, you know, high school. You know, sectionals for the sports, they see, oh wow. Look what, look what they’re doing for girls’ soccer.

Machell Phillips: You know, because we have the facility. That’s the thing. We have, there’s plenty of enough facilities for all different kinds of events. Yeah. and as sports, it really has worked out well. And I, don’t think people even realize with the girls lacrosse championships, the high school girls lacrosse championships. We’re the only place that they’ve ever played those. So when you go beyond and you get into a coaching career, or you play, you know, at the next level. They think of Cortland, they had to come through Cortland to, to win their state championship.

Mike Eves: Yeah, no, that, that’s, that’s pretty, when you think about that, that, that’s pretty amazing.

Mike Eves: That’s going back a long time then, isn’t it?

Machell Phillips: It’s over 30 years now.

Mike Eves: That, that truly, it truly is amazing. Of course, a lot of the big focuses is on the Gutchess Lumber Sports Complex and, and what’s that bringing to the table as, while there’s some good long-term tournaments and some different teams, I know the high school’s love playing there. I know they’ve gotten some great tournaments, local tournaments for the baseball teams and, the softball teams eventually too. I mean, we’re not even at the halfway point of the, the full plans for Gutchess Lumber Sports Complex. I think you mentioned what 60 acres still left out there.

Machell Phillips: There’s still 60 or 70 acres left out there to develop. Yeah. And our hope is, you know, down the road at some point that we’ll have some multipurpose fields out there. Yeah. I mean, that’s the idea. But even the four fields that are there right now. When you look at the numbers that, that they’re generating. Yeah. I mean, it’s kind of mind blowing.

Mike Eves: Yeah. And then so you want to, let’s kind of get into some of the, you know, exactly what we’re kind of talking about. So it’s these baseball tournaments, it’s the prep baseball companies, you know, and these, some of these kids, I mean, baseball players, we’re getting some kids from, from around the country

Machell Phillips: all over.

Mike Eves: Um, you know, it’s a, basically it’s a talent showcase and we’ve, there’s scouts that come in and things, and obviously college recruiters are coming in to watch these kids too. And obviously they’re bringing their families and things too.

Machell Phillips: They are so. Basically April through August, is the time frame right now, and there’s 715 baseball teams that are gonna be coming in here, in that timeframe, you know, and there’s usually about 30 players a team, plus their parents. I mean, there could be bringing a couple hundred people in per team. You do the math on that really quick. That’s, that’s amazing. It’s, it’s astounding and I don’t think, , the general public understands what it brings to this community. You know, these people are, are buying things that. At Marshall’s, at Walmart, at Kinney’s, at, you know, downtown. They’re eating in the restaurants, getting gas.

Mike Eves: Yeah, yeah. No, it’s important. It’s good to, you know, for, to, you know, increase our local tax dollars and things too. Let’s kind of go over a little bit of the schedule there for Gutchess Lumber. ’cause I know they have. There’s so many different things going going on too. And we can even talk about, actually, let’s talk about the schedules for, high school sports and we can talk a little bit about the senior game schedules and things too.

Machell Phillips: Yeah. So most all this is posted on our website, which is Cortland sports.org.

Machell Phillips: Basically, it started last weekend out at Guchess with a high school tournament. Okay. And it’ll go every single weekend from now until the middle of August. With a tournament. So when you look at that. You know, it’s, it’s hard to argue against what they’re doing. Yeah. but we also host a couple of things out there that I don’t know if people are aware of, which is the National Club Baseball Regional Championships.

Machell Phillips: We host, division two and Division one out there. So there’s four teams that come in from across the country and play to go on to the national championships, and they have to come through Cortland for that.

Mike Eves: Oh, that, that, that’s pretty amazing. You know, that’s. That really is. Division one and Division two club baseball teams. That, that’s pretty good.

Machell Phillips: And then of course we move on into May with, things like, uh, state Cup, New York State West Youth Soccer Association. Okay. We host State Cup here, which are the travel teams. Okay. And they’re looking to move on from state cup to the regional and then to nationals. So a lot of times we’re that stepping stone to something else and people are really trying to get to that next level.

Mike Eves: Yeah.

Machell Phillips: So we have that going on. At the same time we’ll be hosting the girls lacrosse section three championships here. Yep. then we move right into flag football and the senior games.

Mike Eves: Oh yeah. Yeah. When do the senior games begin? Is that, that’s May.

Machell Phillips: so it will be June 2nd. June 2nd. Okay. June 2nd through the eighth this year. Yeah. Okay. So we have a schedule that gets posted. We do have a couple things that’ll be, offsite after that time. Tennis is gonna run a little bit later. Cycling’s gonna take place in July. We have ping pong that takes place in Utica, actually. Okay. That’ll be the following weekend. Okay. So it’s not always a compressed schedule.

Mike Eves: Right, right. And of course, yeah, we’ll be promoting the, the Regional Sports Council’s website and we’ll be putting together a schedule too. And letting our people know and, and things too. Yeah. So it’s really like a, you know, if you’re, you’re looking for some good sports too. Of course. They always are inviting the general public and things too.

Machell Phillips: Yep. Come out and watch some of these athletes and things too. So that’s, that’s awesome to see that those first couple weeks in June, , you know, as we end May and then get into June, we’ll be busy. I mean, there’s something almost every single day for two, almost three weeks.

Mike Eves: Oh wow. That’s. That’s huge. And we’re gonna see that with the restaurants being busier and things too. And it’s nice, you know, it’s nice to have a, you know, a heads up and things and people know what’s going on. Hey, why is it so busy? Well, they’ve gotten this, this huge tournament. Michelle, we’re almost outta time here, but, , what else? Anything, any final words you kind of want to say, or about the season or about, economic development or,

Machell Phillips: Well, I think, you know. People just need to be aware of the things that are, that are going on and be welcoming. I think that’s one of the reasons why teams like coming here. I mean, it’s rare to see events continue to return to the same place for 20 years. Yeah. And you know, we can say that we’ve got a lot of events that have been here almost the entire time the sports council’s been in existence.

Mike Eves: That’s that. Just that there alone show tells you just that tells you everything you really need to know.

Machell Phillips: Yeah. It’s been great and we appreciate the community support. I know sometimes it’s tough when you’ve got 20 buses trying to get down Main Street.

Mike Eves:Yep. You know, but that where, you know where a bus pulls in next to a restaurant and you’re going, oh man. You know, but no, I, think it’s good, you know, the restaurants need the support and everything too, so it’s, it’s good. And when you say, you know, $11 million, I mean, that’s, amazing.

Machell Phillips: Yeah, it’s been great. And that’s a good problem to have, so, yeah.

Mike Eves: No, it’s, yeah, definitely not a bad problem.

Mike Eves: Michelle Phelps, the Executive Director of the Cortland County Sports Council here on X 1 0 1, always classic. I’m Mike Eves.