These past few years, all we've ever heard from various local residents and city leaders are the following...
- "We shouldn't revitalize downtown"
- "We shouldn't save Roberts Stadium"
- "The ballpark was a terrible idea and the new arena is now"
- "The new arena and Roberts Stadium will compete, thus the jobs at Roberts Stadium are simply moving downtown"
Amazingly enough, ALL four of those beliefs are dead wrong. Let's take a stroll down memory lane to the years 2001 and 2003.
2001
Then Mayor Russell Lloyd Jr. announced what I believe to be the best master plan ever for downtown Evansville. On the master plan, which I have a copy of if anyone wants to see it, was a ballpark, a marina, an arena, a new civic center, two new parks, a rejuvenated Main Street, and a redug Wabash & Erie Canal. This plan, in my opinion was just one light rail and high speed rail plan away from being the greatest thing since sliced bread. There's no doubt it would have put downtown back on the map.
Once the plan was unveiled, the city decided that they would pursue the ballpark plan first and then work their way around to the other projects. The wheels were then set in motion for the city to begin putting together the ballpark project.
2003
After a few years of work, Mayor Lloyd was ready to announce the location for the ballpark. Although it was already placed on the master plan, there was still much discussion about where it would go. While I preferred the Mulzer Stone site for a new ballpark, the lot bounded by Fulton, Riverside, 2nd Street, and 3rd Avenue was chosen.
But who would be the team that would play in this new ballpark?
Meet the Waves
Wilmington Waves (2001)
The South Georgia Waves franchise began play in Wilmington, North Carolina in 2001 as the Wilmington Waves. They were a Low-A class team that played in the South Atlantic League, and were a farm team of the Los Angeles Dodgers for the franchise’s only year in Wilmington. They played all of their home games at Brooks Field, on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. However, because Brooks Field was not easy to spot on campus, attendance for the Waves' home games was substantially low. Because of this handicap, the Waves were given a limited amount of time to find a new stadium or build a new one. But the deadline was not met and, prior to the 2002 season, the Wilmington Waves were sold and moved to Albany, Georgia, where the franchise became the South Georgia Waves.
South Georgia Waves (2002)
Once in Albany, Georgia, things didn't get any better for the Waves in the attendance column. Although the Waves posted a 75-63 record on the field, the Waves attendance was only around 1,000 people a game. David Heller and Mandalay Entertainment, an organization that owns many minor league baseball teams, had recently purchased the team and didn't want to stay in Albany with attendance being so low.
Evansville's Big Break
Right off the bat (no pun intended), Evansville caught a big break. They had found a team willing to relocate the same year they were going to build a new 6,000 seat ballpark. They also happened to find not one but two star baseball players who were willing to invest in the team as owners.
In 2003, Don Mattingly and Cal Ripken Jr. announced that they would be purchasing a piece of the Waves from David Heller and would be relocating to Evansville, IN for the 2004 season...
http://www.accessnorthga.com/detail.php?n=185671&c=3
http://www.walb.com/story/1078068/waves-ready-to-move-again?clienttype=printable
At this point, EVERYTHING was going right for Evansville. We were going to get a brand new ballpark with a professional baseball team that had two baseball stars as owners. Surely, no one would screw this up, right? Well, think again...
http://www.courierpress.com/news/2003/feb/04/fanello-mosby-oppose-stadium/
Two Vanderburgh County Commissioners registered their objection Monday to a Downtown baseball stadium, calling it an unwise use of public money.
"This selection has proceeded despite public opposition to the project and without any input," Fanello said.
"Take one-fifth of the money that's talked about being spent Downtown and use it to renovate Bosse Field," (Mosby) said.
Stadium backers say the project would create jobs. Mosby said Evansville has a lengthy list of needed storm sewer projects that could put people to work.
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:0lXCwrdfQcUJ:www.vanderburgh.org/auditor/comm_mins/February/Feb0303cc.htm+david+mosby+bosse+field+sewers&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&source=www.google.com
President Mosby: I guess, my comment would be, and I have hashed out, I guess, within myself a lot about the baseball diamond, or the baseball stadium downtown. I can actually say, as an elected official, I, for one, did not have any dialogue, I should say with the Mayor, or the city over this. My first thought is in the state of the way things are today, and the financial condition of the county, the city, the school corporation, we’ve heard about their financial woes recently. I would not be in favor of a downtown baseball stadium. I think we have probably one of the nicest baseball parks around in Bosse Field. I mean, Bosse Field is a tremendous asset to this community. There has been movies shot at Bosse Field. There has been ball played at Bosse Field. High schools have used Bosse Field. Bosse Field has been a grand facility. I think we could probably take one fifth of the money that they are talking about spending downtown, and probably renovate Bosse Field, and all the mechanicals, and probably add a few seats to it. I sat on the City Council, I guess, when this city pondered building a new arena downtown, and at one time we were given a price of about $78 million plus to put an arena downtown. At that time this city had to make what was probably a financial decision in the best interest of the whole community. We did not elect to build a downtown arena. In turn we spent $16.1 million, about, per se one fifth or sixth of the cost again, and we have Roberts Stadium today. And Roberts Stadium has served the needs of this community very well over the past few years. I know there’s groups out there that say we need to build a ball diamond. It’s jobs for this city. It’s jobs for the community. I can assure you, once again, when I sat back on the City Council, there’s a storm sewer master plan sitting down there at the Board of Works with 100 plus projects on it, at a cost of about $178 million. If this city has $25 or $30 million to put into a ball diamond, then they need to pull that master plan off the shelves down there, and start some work.
Like always, the worst of the worst in Evansville always rise to the top, and this time it just happened to be the man who is partially responsible for a Roberts Stadium below the water table: David Mosby.
Mr. Mosby, along with Catherine Fanello, came out against the ballpark proposal because he said it was too costly, the jobs should be created elsewhere, and he believed that the city should renovate Bosse Field instead.
It was also Mr. Mosby who was one of the council members to reject the warnings that lowering Roberts Stadium's floor would be a bad idea...
http://local.evpl.org/views/viewimage.asp?ID=931099
So after everything was said and done, Evansville lost. Mayor Lloyd called off the ballpark proposal and that was the end of the South Georgia Waves coming to Evansville.
The announcement was so quick that it even caught Waves owner David Heller off guard. Suddenly his team had no home for the 2004 season.
Columbus Catfish (2003-2009)
With just a few days before the 2003 South Atlantic League (SALLY) was set to begin, Heller made the decision to go ahead and relocate to Columbus, Georgia. The team remained the South Georgia Waves for 2003 but changed to Columbus Catfish in 2004.
This quick relocation decision proved to be another bad choice. Despite the Catfish winning the title in 2007, attendance figures were still extremely low. This was the last we heard of the Waves franchise in Evansville. We were led to believe that we made the right decision to pass on the building the new ballpark because it would have been a mistake just like the relocation to Columbus. We would have lost money on the ballpark, would not have generated any economic impact for downtown, and attendance would have been low for sure. What Evansville doesn't know is the rest of the story...
Bowling Green Hot Rods (2009- Present)
After many futile attempts to make it work in Columbus, David Heller decided to sell the team to Art Solomon who would be moving the franchise to Bowling Green...
http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/2008/06/20/352160/its-official-catfish-leaving-columbus.html
Bowling Green, whose city population is only 58,067 (Metro: 120,595) stepped up to the plate even though their population is only half of Evansville's. Instead of renovating Nick Denes Field, where WKU plays, Bowling Green decided to build a brand new ballpark.
On June 17, 2008, the city of Bowling Green issued $25 million worth of bonds to construct Bowling Green Ballpark...
http://www.baseballparks.com/bowlinggreen-2.asp
Bowling Green's brand new 4,500 seat ballpark has been a hit since Opening Day when it attracted 6,886 fans. Each year, attendance at Bowling Green Ballpark has increased. The Hot Rods have had a positive impact both on the community and on the city's economy...
http://www.wbko.com/home/headlines/43208177.html
http://www.wbko.com/news/headlines/100660889.html
The Hot Rods are responsible for an estimated 1,500-1,600 extra hotel nights in the city each season!
How did Bowling Green build what Evansville wouldn't? Simply put, they committed to spending money in their downtown. Just like Evansville was going to do, Bowling Green set up a TIF district where funds from downtown would stay downtown instead of going into state coffers. Bowling Green's TIF is estimated to be at $200 million.
With the construction of Bowling Green Ballpark, the city decided to make it a part of a massive urban renewal development to the tune of $251 million (already $150 million has been spent). You can take a look at all the redevelopment going on in downtown Bowling Green right here...
http://southcentralky.com/Living-Here-Downtown-Redevelopment.aspx
http://www.southcentralky.com/media/docs/Downtown_Map.pdf
While downtown Bowling Green continues to thrive with a new ballpark, Evansville's riverfront continues to suffer the consequences. If you drive by what was suppose to be the location of the new ballpark, you will only see an empty parking lot and a renovated adult bookstore. Outside of Casino Aztar, there is little hope for the land once pegged to be a ballpark.
And don't think for a second that Evansville saved $25 million by cancelling this project. No, it just went into terrible road projects such as this one...
http://www.courierpress.com/news/2011/may/23/no-headline---24a0xgreenriver/
"Now that the most expensive locally funded road project ever in Vanderburgh County is largely complete, county officials are considering projects to maximize the impact of a revamped North Green River Road.
The $25 million project took more than two years to build and widened the road from two to four — and in some places five — lanes north of Pigeon Creek."
Also I may add, Nick Denes Field did undergo a small $1 million renovation for the WKU Hilltoppers while Bosse Field has not received a renovation (which is a good thing!).
So most of you are probably wondering by now: Why bring this up and what does it have to do with Roberts Stadium? Well, here are several things we need to realize from this situation.
1. Building a new arena downtown is a good thing not a bad thing. It will be key in revitalizing our downtown. If we would have renovated Roberts Stadium, no downtown renewal would be taking place. This is definitely a step in the right direction. Look at what Bowling Green is doing!
2. The new arena and Roberts Stadium are not competing. Just like Nick Denes Field and the new Bowling Green Ballpark coexist, so too can Roberts Stadium and the new arena. Bowling Green Ballpark is used for professional baseball and all other premier events while Nick Denes Field serves WKU. Here, we will use the new arena for professional hockey, Aces basketball, premier concerts, and anything else that is a regional attraction. This will allow us to use Roberts Stadium for mid-sized events such as indoor soccer, indoor football, minor league basketball, small trade shows, small concerts, as well as youth tournaments. Roberts Stadium is not standing in the way of progress, it is complimenting progress with the new arena!
3. Don't settle for a renovation. Many Roberts Stadium supporters believed that Roberts Stadium should have been renovated into a premier arena. But if you look at what the last renovation did to Roberts Stadium's structure you will see that we would basically be demolishing Roberts Stadium and building a new arena in its place if we did it again. We shall not renovate Roberts Stadium and we shall not even think about laying a finger on historic Bosse Field. Mr. Mosby is wrong, renovating historic sports venues is not the way to go!
4. We need to spend money downtown not the county. Look at what a new ballpark could have done for our downtown. Don't you think that would have been a much better investment than widening Green River Road? That decision will now see many more residents move into the area which will result in much more money needing to be allocated for infrastructure.
Furthermore, Mr. Mosby believed that cancelling the ballpark would be a good idea because it would allow us to fix our sewer problem. Wrong again. Look around town, we still have a major sewer problem even without the ballpark (Now the EPA has gotten involved!). Instead, we put the $25 million into expanding Green River Road which will force us to have to expand our sewer system over time. The ballpark and the sewer problem were not related just like Roberts Stadium needing its floor raised and the Parks Department needing additional funds are not related. You can and should do both!
As a whole, look at what we're investing in (roads in the county) and look at what Bowling Green is investing in ($251 million in their downtown), which one do you think will be most beneficial?
5. Roberts Stadium's jobs ARE NOT simple moving to the downtown new arena. Look at what happened when we cancelled our downtown ballpark. Did all of that economic development and new job creation go to Bosse Field? The answer is no, it never happened at all. If we would have done nothing, premier concerts, the Icemen, and many other events would have simply skipped Evansville instead of coming to Roberts Stadium, thus we would be losing the jobs and economic impact that is now going to take place downtown.
Furthermore, we must keep Roberts Stadium around to ADD to the new jobs and economic impact of the new arena. If we bring in indoor football, minor league basketball, indoor soccer, small concerts, small trade shows, and youth sports, we will be ADDING to the jobs market and creating an additional economic impact for the city.
I also believe we should do the same thing with Bosse Field if we ever decide to build a new ballpark! We must build the softball fields at Kleymeyer Park so that youth softball and baseball championship games can be played at historic Bosse Field. Couple that with the Otters playing on the off days of the minor league baseball team (Would form a rivalry too) and we would still have a thriving Bosse Field district!
Overall, I believe that many lessons can be learned from the downtown ballpark mistake. We have to realize that building a new arena is a good thing as it has nothing to do with Roberts Stadium. We must build new facilities while improving our old ones at the same time.
Many locals want you to believe that building new venues such as a new arena or a new ballpark are a bad thing for Evansville, and we must choose between our old facilities and our new facilities.
They NEVER tell you what happened to the South Georgia Waves. They NEVER tell you that that franchise ended up relocating to a city in the Tri-State that is half the size of Evansville. They NEVER tell you that that franchise built a brand new ballpark in downtown Bowling Green without having to demolish or compete with one single ballpark. They also NEVER tell you that Bowling Green Ballpark is an economic catalyst for downtown Bowling Green and WKU's Nick Denes Field still underwent a renovation even though the city decided not to place a professional baseball team there.
But now you know............ THE REST OF THE STORY!
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