Stadium

Washington County bands perform Tuesday night at South Hagerstown High School stadium at the 31st annual Showcase of Marching Bands.

Local leaders have launched about as many plans for a new baseball stadium as Helen of Troy launched ships. Over the past 15 years, there have been a plethora of proposals, ultimatums, architectural plans, back-room meetings, funding mechanisms - and absolutely no results. Some might have to limber up their memories, but there was a time when pro baseball in Hagerstown was big. Led by the crazies of Section H, the old ballpark swayed at night when the Class AA Orioles affiliate took the field.

Environmental testing is continuing at the site of Hagerstown's proposed downtown multiuse sports and events center, and a full report is expected by the beginning of 2013, according to city Engineer Rodney Tissue. Workers were drilling in The Herald-Mail parking lot Tuesday as part of the Phase 2 tests to determine if the ground is safe for construction and to check for any potential hazards in the ground, Tissue said. “They retrieve the soil and send it to a lab for testing,” he said in an email.

Two matters should be evident following the Hagerstown city elections: First, it is impossible to read the election results as anything other than a rejection of the $37 million multiuse stadium as proposed on the corners of Summit Avenue and Baltimore Street. Second, this rejection, in and of itself, solves none of the city's problems. In other words, if the stadium as currently envisioned isn't the answer, what is? It will in all likelihood be up to the incoming council to make some quick and consequential decisions concerning the project.

The proposed $30 million stadium to primarily serve as home to the Hagerstown Suns minor league baseball team is no easy call. To broaden its appeal, local leaders have set it up as a multiuse facility that could be used for high school sports, music festivals and perhaps even a minor league football team. The stadium site is also being sold as a key to downtown economic success, snug as it is against South Potomac Street in the city's core. The stadium is not cheap; as currently imagined, it would cost local government, i.e., the taxpayers, $800,000 a year to pay off its share of the $30 million note in 20 years, the balance coming from the state and from private sources (which we need to hear more about before taking an unequivocal stand)

The biggest favor minor-league baseball supporters could do for themselves is to stop talking about stadiums as an engine for economic development. That's like trying to sell a Land Rover based on its gas mileage. It's not just baseball that does this, obviously. Everything today is being touted as a “jobs creator,” most amusingly the ill-fated merger of AT&T and T-Mobile. For the last time that a merger of two corporate behemoths created jobs instead of destroying them, you'd probably have to go back to the Guilded Age. The next thing baseball supporters might consider is to stop placing the weight of city viability on the stadium's shoulders.

The Herald-Mail has avoided taking an editorial position on whether to build a new multiuse stadium in downtown Hagerstown because, as proposed, the project would consume much of The Herald-Mail Co.'s parking lot. We know that readers might think that any support was rooted in a desire to sell the parking lot and make money, or that opposition was rooted in desire to keep the parking lot as is. To date, the company has not received an offer for...

Some local officials and the Hagerstown Suns baseball club want to build a new city stadium, paid for by the city, county, state and the Suns. As a baseball fan, I hope this happens; a taxpayer-funded stadium would be a nice government subsidy to me. But local residents should wonder whether the Suns and I, and other stadium users, deserve it. Providing subsidies is a duty of government. But subsidies should only pay for important goods and services that people are somehow obstructed from buying or selling privately.

When plans began to circulate last year for a new multiuse stadium in downtown Hagerstown, the goal was twofold. First, the stadium would make it possible to keep Minor League Baseball in Hagerstown. Second, it would be an economic engine for the city. To some, the second goal was perhaps more important than the first. Located just a block from the Potomac Street Arts and Entertainment District, the proposed stadium would have added juice to the city's core. No one felt the stadium could be a savior on its own, but the energy created by the project certainly would have jumpstarted other downtown projects.

Hagerstown Mayor David S. Gysberts, the five-member city council and other city staff met with members of the Washington County state delegation Tuesday evening for about 40 minutes inside the University System of Maryland at Hagerstown. Most of the conversation revolved around the issues municipalities are facing with the EPA-mandated stormwater management changes to improve water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and the possibility of asking the state for funding toward a city redevelopment project, which could include a potential stadium.

Although the topic of building a multiuse stadium for the Hagerstown Suns has been conspicuously absent from recent Hagerstown City Council agendas, talk about the minor league baseball team's future heated up again Tuesday, when a council member suggested the “wheels and cogs” are being set in motion behind the scenes. Councilman Kristin B. Aleshire said he was unaware of the meeting Mayor David S. Gysberts had with Suns majority owner Bruce Quinn last week, which Gysberts acknowledged in the Saturday edition of The Herald-Mail.

Notably missing from the 42nd spring Mountain Heritage Arts & Crafts Festival this weekend was the booth occupied by Pam and Ren Parziale, owners of Sycamore Pottery in Kearneysville, W.Va. Instead of plates, bowls and vases, the shelves and walls carried the works of mixed-media artisan Rebecca Grace Jones of Shepherdstown, W.Va. The Parziales have been setting up their booth on the corner of tent No. 3 since the Jefferson County Chamber of Commerce held the first craft show in 1972.

“We continue to work toward something we can do to keep the Suns in Hagerstown,” Gysberts said. “... We're doing everything we can to keep the team viable in Hagerstown.” The mayor confirmed he met with Suns majority owner Bruce Quinn Tuesday, but would not disclose what was discussed. But Gysberts answered affirmatively when asked if he would describe the meeting as “positive.” On the same day as the mayor's meeting with Quinn, the Fredericksburg City Council voted unanimously to spend $50,000 to evaluate a proposal to bring a minor league baseball team to the Virginia city, according to The Free Lance Star in Fredericksburg.

I have previously written in support of locating the new stadium in downtown Hagerstown.  Readers have asked why a suburban county resident should feel strongly about this proposal. After all, the City Council seems to have rejected it and has begun to examine at least three alternative sites - the old hospital and two adjacent to Municipal Stadium. The little bit of information about these sites that has been made public has not changed my mind. For those who don't know about this initiative, the stadium included a new parking deck.

Reader's Digest has teamed up with Geico, Purina's Beneful dog food and The Salvation Army to bring a family fun tent to Municipal Stadium, 274 E. Memorial Blvd., Hagerstown. The event called “Best in America” begins at 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday, June 16. Events include: Geico's Ring Toss, Lizard Leap and a photo station to take a family photo with Geico Gecko. Beneful's three Pet Monty, in which participants guess which water bowl contains the hidden item. Correct guesses will be rewarded with a sample of Beneful dog food.

Reports that Fredericksburg, Va., may be making a play to attract the Hagerstown Suns reached a fever pitch Thursday, when Suns majority owner Bruce Quinn was quoted in a Virginia newspaper saying he's going “full-speed ahead” with moving the team there. Quinn's comments appeared in The Free Lance-Star, which quoted him as saying he would move the team if the Fredericksburg City Council approves construction of a new multipurpose baseball stadium. In an email Thursday afternoon, Quinn told The Herald-Mail that he has not yet given up on getting something done in Hagerstown, “However, it's been like square-dancing in snow skis.” Hagerstown Councilman Lewis C. Metzner, who earlier this week hinted that the city might be close to forging its own deal to keep the Suns, said he was not surprised by the news.

A market analysis study that looks at the economic sustainability of a multiuse stadium in Fredericksburg, Va., was unveiled Monday, and concludes that there is a demand for such a facility there, according to a Fredericksburg Economic Development Authority member. “It showed that we have a very strong market,” EDA member Bob Carter said Monday afternoon. Richard Tremblay, Fredericksburg's assistant director for economic development, said representatives of the firm gave a 20-minute presentation of its report to EDA members Monday morning before fielding questions.

Attracting professional baseball continues to be a major talking point in Fredericksburg, Va., and it's drawing concern from at least one Hagerstown City Council member. A study that examines the economic feasibility of a multiuse stadium in Fredericksburg will be presented Monday to the city's economic development officials, according to an agenda found on the Fredericksburg Economic Development Authority's website. “I get a feeling that the Fredericksburg proposal, the movement down there is a serious proposal,” Councilman Donald F. Munson said Thursday.

When plans began to circulate last year for a new multiuse stadium in downtown Hagerstown, the goal was twofold. First, the stadium would make it possible to keep Minor League Baseball in Hagerstown. Second, it would be an economic engine for the city. To some, the second goal was perhaps more important than the first. Located just a block from the Potomac Street Arts and Entertainment District, the proposed stadium would have added juice to the city's core. No one felt the stadium could be a savior on its own, but the energy created by the project certainly would have jumpstarted other downtown projects.

A Maryland couple has donated a $475,000 house to raise funds for the high school they attended and loved. Mark and Donna Gaver of Middletown, Md., credit the discipline and teamwork they experienced through high school sports to their success of today. Now, they have donated a house for a raffle to help raise a million dollars toward the renovation of the Middletown High School sports stadium. The house, aptly named “Middletown Dream Home,” boasts four bedrooms, three and a half bathrooms and a two-car garage.