Page 4 - BusinessWest February 19, 2024

Taking the Ball ... and Running with It
Holyoke Conceptualizes Olympic-style Sports Complex
BY GEORGE O’BRIEN
[email protected]
esar Ruiz admits that the first time he and Holyoke Mayor Joshua Garcia discussed the notion of bringing a sports com- plex to the Paper City,
one that could potentially become the new home to the Volleyball Hall of Fame, the talk “pretty much went in one ear and out the other.”
“The feasibility study indicates that we can draw from multiple areas and bring people to Holyoke. We’re not approaching this as a regular sports facility, but a venue that can draw regionally and from several different states.”
That was roughly two years ago, and Ruiz said his lack of enthusiasm had less to do with the concept, which he has long championed, and far more to do with the many other things he had going on his life, especially the East Longmeadow-based home-care and healthcare staffing agency called Gold- en Years, the venture he started with a few partners and has led to rapid and dramatic growth, so much that he was named BusinessWest’s Top Entrepre- neur for 2020.
With that company on firmer ground and, increasingly, being managed by
his children, Ruiz was more responsive when the subject of a sports complex came up again at the beginning of
Conceptual renderings of the sports complex planned for Holyoke, one that will include everything from athletic fields and indoor courts to a hotel and a new home for the Volleyball Hall of Fame.
4 FEBRUARY 19, 2024
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