The Van Andel Arena is a perfect example of the values of the Grand Rapids and the 250th anniversary of the founding of this country

At the beginning of the week I wrote a post entitled, We can’t let the people in power in Grand Rapids dictate the narrative about the 250th anniversary of the US. In that post I stated:

Grand Rapids has created a committee called GR A250, which stands for the Grand Rapids America 250th anniversary of the US founding. I have written about this group, who makes up that committee and how they kicked off attempting to dictate the narratives about the founding of Grand Rapids and the US, with Doug DeVos and Mayor LaGrand giving talks about their sanitized version of the US.

In a recent Facebook post, the GR A250 group wrote the following:

As Grand Rapids prepares to commemorate America’s 250th, GR A250 invites the community to reflect on the values that connect us and that shape the future we hope to build in the years ahead.

You can spot the OUR CITY. OUR FUTURE. building wrap on Van Andel Arena downtown! Next time you walk by, be sure to snap a pic, share it to your story and tag @ gra250 to be part of this moment in history.

What a strange and bizarre way of thinking about values, although in many ways it makes complete sense that they would use the building wrap message on the Van Andel Arena, since it absolutely reflects the values that this committee embraces. Maybe a good way to articulate what I mean is to provide some historical context for the arena.

Before the arena was built the space it sits on now was a fairly large parking lot. The DeVos created entity Grand Action proposed the arena and since it displaced existing parking space the city needed to do something to create additional parking.

On the west side of the river between Bridge St. and Lake Michigan Dr. there was a neighborhood with about 60 houses, most of which were rentals. A family business had purchased the majority of these rental properties and purposely let them fall is disrepair, because behind closed doors the plan was to level those homes and create parking that was necessary to make up for the parking spaces that the arena had displaced. Interestingly enough, part of that parking that was created after leveling that neighborhood is on the exact location where the Amway soccer stadium is being constructed.

During the arena construction there were efforts to get the city, the county and the state to provide public funding for the project. Grand Action pushed for public funding from multiple sectors, but they also provided opportunities for private donors, a few large donors and others who could get their name on a brick that would make up part of the plaza area in front of the arena. The largest private donor was the Van Andel family, which is why it is named the Van Andel Arena. However, if you combined the amount of public money from the city, the county and the state, that amount covered the majority of the cost of the construction, which begs the question of why is it that the arena was named after one of the Amway co-founders?

Another interesting part of the arena construction is that the Heartside Neighborhood group was lobbying heavily to make sure that there would be jobs for the those who lived in that neighborhood, particularly people who stayed in the shelters or in subsidized housing in the area. A verbal agreement to hired residents from Heartside was agreed upon, but what the Arena Authority did was to avoid hiring Heartside residents on a permanent basis. Instead, Heartside residents had to come to the south entrance of the arena on the days that there was an event and people would be hired for day labor, mostly to clean and possible work in the concessions area. The full time jobs went to other non-Heartside residents, jobs that paid better with benefits.

In addition, the GRPD has always been used by the Van Andel Arena for dealing with traffic issues, because there is a state law that dictates that reality. The GRPD has also policed (harassed) Heartside residents that are unhoused, have mental health issues and/or substance abuse issues, so that those attending Van Andel Arena events are not being asked by people for money.

As the Van Andel Arena evolved there was a professional arena football team created, which was owned by Doug DeVos, called the Rampage. That team didn’t last long as there was not sufficient interest locally in supporting arena football. Eventually, there was the professional hockey team that played in the Van Andel Arena, which was also owned by Dough DeVos and has continued to this day.

In 2024, the women’s volleyball team known as the Grand Rapids Rise began playing at the Van Andel Arena. That team is also owned by Doug DeVos and it part of DP Fox Sports & Entertainment.

So, you see the pattern? The arena is proposed by Grand Action, which was founded by the DeVos and Van Andel families. A DeVos family members owns two of the professional teams that currently play in the Van Andel Arena. The Van Andel Arena also  mislead Heartside residents on the matter of provide steady employment, while at the same time aggressively policing people to make sure that they would not make those attending events at the Van Andel Arena uncomfortable.

Lastly, the Van Andel Arena provides a fabulous opportunity for people who are coming from out of town to stay at a nearby hotel, most of which are also owned by the DeVos family.

Therefore, using the Van Andel Arena as a platform to celebrate values of the city and the 250th anniversary of the founding is in one sense rather offensive, since the history of the Van Andel Arena is rather undemocratic and has been an asset that has made the DeVos and Van Andel families lots of money. At the same time one could argue that the Van Andel Arena does reflect the values of the city and the 250th anniversary of the founding of the US, since it is rooted in displacing people, exploiting people and generating significant wealth for a few members of the Capitalist Class. Yeah, that sounds like the values of Grand Rapids and good old USA.