Should Columbus spend up to $50 million for Minor League baseball? Council must decide

Columbus city councilors are being asked to approve almost $50 million in bonds to upgrade Golden Park and finance a mixed-use development around the stadium in the hope of bringing Minor League baseball back to town.

And they are not all pleased with the prospect.

Council is having a private meeting Thursday morning to hear more details on the proposal, and then may be asked to take a public vote on the bond issue that Mayor Skip Henderson said amounts to around $46 million to $47 million.

Besides bringing the ball park up to Minor League standards, with the hope of attracting a Double-A team from the Southern League, the concept involves adding residential and commercial development to the South Commons between the ball field and Memorial Stadium, city leaders said.

Mayor Skip Henderson said councilors were briefed on the project during a closed session at their Dec. 12 meeting. That briefing and Thursday’s session are private under an open-meetings law exception for handling real estate.

Henderson said it’s an opportunity to invest in an underserved area while possibly spawning additional development to the south between Victory Drive and the Chattahoochee River, tying it to the downtown entertainment district.

Studies show it could support 3,000 more jobs, he said.

He said developers envision a hotel overlooking the outfield wall and loft apartments built over street-level retail space, along with added greenspace in what’s now a “massive sea of asphalt” between the ball field and the football stadium.

He said the time to take advantage of this opportunity is running out, as the unidentified proponents want to have the ball field ready for the 2025 season. That’s why council’s holding a called meeting on it Thursday.

“It’s a very short runway,” he said Wednesday, acknowledging some councilors feel pressured to act fast. “I feel rushed, too.”

Though council will meet privately to discuss the matter, any vote has to be taken in public.

Raising taxes on the table?

Some councilors are questioning the timing and the funding mechanism, asking whether council would have to raise property taxes to back the bonds. Council recently cut the property tax millage rate after complaints about skyrocketing tax assessments.

Henderson said the funding source is not his decision.

“The council will determine how that is done,” he said.

Some councilors have reservations about that.

“We’re not going to increase taxes unless absolutely necessary,” said citywide council representative Judy Thomas.

She recalled that council just cut the property tax rate, and abruptly rescinding that could look like they made a mistake: “We would have to say, ‘Oops!’”

She said council’s essentially being told, “If you build it, we will come,” alluding to the baseball movie “Field of Dreams.”

The city would continue to own the land, and lease it out, she said, and she would not favor any nominal leasing agreement. “If we have to lease that land, it’s going to be market value,” she said.

District 5 Councilor Charmaine Crabb, who represents midtown, had fundamental doubts about the proposal, in light of Golden Park’s history in the Minor League.

“We’ve had baseball several times, and we don’t go and watch it, and it goes away,” she said.

The city needs to renovate its other recreational facilities that residents are using now, before it embarks on this endeavor, she said.

“We don’t even take care of what we have,” she said.

Attracting tourists does not supersede serving the people who live here, she said. “Let’s take care of the citizens before we start taking care of visitors.”

She was concerned about Columbus taxpayers footing the bill for business interests that aren’t local.

“We put $50 million in it, and they don’t put in a dime, and they don’t live here,” she said. “That’s what they’re shoving down our throats.”

The voters should be asked whether they want to pay for this development, she said: “If we want to do this, let’s have a referendum.”

Elections director Nancy Boren said the deadline to get the matter on the ballot for Georgia’s March 2024 presidential preference primary has passed. The next deadline, to get a measure on the May 21 state primary ballot, is Feb. 13, she said.

Golden Park and Minor League teams

City leaders have been talking about redevelopment around the ball field since May, when council unanimously approved a resolution endorsing Henderson’s effort to land a Minor League Baseball team through negotiations with the company Diamond Baseball Holdings.

Among the teams Diamond Holdings owns and operates are the Rome, Georgia Braves; the Pearl, Mississippi Braves; the Midland, Texas Rockhounds; the San Jose, California Giants; and the Wichita, Kansas, Wind Surge.

Councilors first discussed the idea in February, during another closed-door session, before asking state legislators to pass a bill removing restrictive covenants that reserved the South Commons property strictly for a public, recreational uses. That legislation later passed the Georgia General Assembly, opening other options for the land.

Columbus last had a Minor League Baseball team in 2008. The five-acre ballpark at 100 Fourth St. now is home to the Columbus Chatt-a-Hoots, who are in the Sunbelt Baseball League that offers a summer season for college athletes hoping to play professionally.

The swath of land known as the South Commons includes around 170 acres, encompassing the city’s softball complex, where teams practiced for the 1996 Olympic Games held in Golden Park, the A.J. McClung Memorial Stadium, the Columbus Civic Center and the city ice rink.

The commons originated as vacant land set aside for public use when Georgia established Columbus as a planned city in 1827 and 1828.

Golden Park was built in the 1920s and named for T.E. Golden of Golden’s Foundry, who chaired the city’s recreation board.

Here are some of the teams that have been based there over the years:

• The Columbus Foxes, named for former Atlanta player Jim Fox, the team manager, played at Golden Park 1926-1932.

• The Columbus Red Birds, affiliated with the St. Louis Cardinals, played there 1936-1955.

• The Columbus Yankees, affiliated with the New York Yankees, 1964-1966.

• The Columbus Astros, affiliated with the Houston Astros, 1970-1988; renamed the Mudcats 1989-1990.

• The Columbus RedStixx, affiliated with the Cleveland Indians, 1991-2002.

• The South Georgia Waves, associated with the Los Angeles Dodgers, 2003.

• The Columbus Catfish, associated with the Dodgers, 2004-2006; then with the Tampa Bay Rays, 2007-2008.