Hagerstown, Salisbury stadiums get cash during Maryland Board of Public Works meeting

Stadium and related projects across Maryland — including in Hagerstown and Salisbury — were on the agenda Wednesday during a morning Board of Public Works meeting held at the State House.

Work is being finalized with the Baltimore Orioles on its home field, money was set aside for improvements to Arthur Perdue Stadium as well as construction of the Hagerstown Multi-Use Sports and Entertainment Facility, and approval was given to sell a former newspaper office in the Hub City.

Here's a look at what happened.

Baltimore Orioles, Maryland lawyers hammering out details

Gov. Wes Moore said that a lease agreement between the Baltimore Orioles and the state is in the works before the three-member body he leads approved several other stadium-related projects across the state.

Moore’s remarks came less than one week after he appeared on the video board at Oriole Park at Camden Yards alongside team CEO John Angelos with an announcement that a “deal” had been reached to keep the ballclub in Baltimore for at least 30 years. The eight page “Memorandum of Understanding” agreed to on Sept. 27 by Angelos and Maryland Stadium Authority Chair Craig Thompson is not the final lease document, however.

“Lawyers from both the Orioles and also the state are working to finalize those agreements literally as we speak," Moore said.

The governor’s comments came during discussion of an agenda item to approve about $6.6 million for renovations at M&T Bank Stadium, home to the Baltimore Ravens for the last 25 years.

The contract is the first paid for by the $1.2 billion authorized under Moore’s predecessor, Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, who approved legislation with $600 million in funding for both the Baltimore team’s stadiums, contingent upon the signing of a long-term lease agreement. (The Hogan-led Board agreed to a 15-year lease agreement with the Ravens in January of this year.)

Funds approved for Bowie and Salisbury's minor league stadiums

While the Baltimore stadiums garnered the most discussion from Moore, state Comptroller Brooke Lierman focused on the renovations for a pair of minor league baseball stadiums.

Salisbury’s Arthur Perdue Stadium and Bowie’s Prince George’s Stadium received the go-ahead for the first step in renovations from the board, which approved two, 26-month contracts to a Baltimore-based firm, Gilbane Building Co., for “design and preconstruction services” at the sites.

“These are huge structures we need to last multiple lifetimes, so it is essential they be built sustainably,” said Lierman, noting that she had been to both with her children.

The Salisbury stadium, home to the Delmarva Shorebirds, a single-A affiliate of the Orioles, is scheduled to receive $614,961 in services while the Prince George’s Stadium, home to the Bowie Baysox, a double-A affiliate of the Orioles, is scheduled to receive $864,581.30 in services.

The stadiums of the Orioles-affiliated teams got the attention during the board’s public meeting, but Moore, Lierman, and a deputy sitting in for state Treasurer Dereck Davis unanimously approved an agenda that had a few other projects related to the Maryland Stadium Authority.

Hagerstown project among additional state bonds approved for baseball facilities

The board approved the Stadium Authority’s issuing of bonds of up to $120 million for stadium projects, including up to $20 million for the Hagerstown Multi-Use Sport and Events Facility. The approval comes after state Sen. Paul Corderman, R-Washington/Frederick, a backer of the baseball stadium project from the beginning, sponsored and passed legislation in the General Assembly this year to provide for an additional $20 million in financing for sports entertainment facilities.

The Hagerstown facility already set up by statute to receive $59,500,000 in Stadium Authority funds would be eligible for the additional money, according to Corderman’s 2023 bill’s fiscal note.

Hogan, who headlined a celebration at the stadium site last October, included an additional $8.5 million in a supplemental budget, and the General Assembly in last year’s capital budget pitched in another $1.5 million. Construction at the site is continuing, and power and telecom electrical service pathways are being installed by an electrician in the main building and team store this month.

Explicitly noted in the board’s approved agenda item is that proceeds from the bonds may be used to “pay to complete construction of the Hagerstown Multi-Use Sport and Events Facility.”

Board approves sale of former Herald-Mail building, funds for Annapolis building

The Board of Public Works also approved the sale of the building (adjacent to the stadium site) which once housed The Herald-Mail newspaper offices. 2023 SUMMIT, LLC, an entity created in May and registered to a Hagerstown attorney, purchased the property for $1.8 million and the state funds will also be used towards the new facility.

Greg Snook, president of the Hagerstown-Washington County Industrial Foundation, known as CHIEF, the nonprofit which owned and operated the building before the Stadium Authority, said in a phone interview he did not have “any idea what the plans are” for the multistory structure, which sits beyond the stadium’s planned left field wall.

Final contracts are being awarded for the stadium’s scoreboard, railings, lockers, food service and finishes, according to an October project update published by the Stadium Authority. Howard "Blackie" Bowen, one of five members of the new team’s ownership group, said last month that baseball could be played at the stadium as soon as May.

More: Hagerstown stadium site has steeple, history towering over it

Other sports facilities in the state include Ripken Stadium in Harford County’s Aberdeen, Regency Furniture Stadium, the home of the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs in Waldorf, Harry Grove Stadium, the home of the Frederick Keys, and the ballfields for Bowie and Salisbury’s teams.

The state’s Board of Public Works approved one other item Wednesday for the Maryland Stadium Authority that had nothing to do with ballfields. It approved much of the nearly $100 million in funding for the stadium authority to raze and replace the Department of Legislative Services building.

That building, which neighbors the governor's mansion in Annapolis, will house the department that conducts much of the state’s business. It is scheduled to be operational in December 2024.

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Dwight A. Weingarten is an investigative reporter, covering the Maryland State House and state issues. He can be reached at dweingarten@gannett.com or on Twitter at @DwightWeingart2.

This article originally appeared on Salisbury Daily Times: Stadium construction, upgrades in Hagerstown, Salisbury get state cash