FRESNO - Baseball is the perfect sport for Fresno. In fact Fresno had one of the first lighted baseball fields in the United States at the trun of the Century. Things went so well for Night Baseball that Fresno built a larger stadium at the John M. Euless Ballpark in the 1930's. After that profesional baseball in Fresno fell on hard times.
The people of Fresno maintained interest in College and University Athletic Programs, however. So, even though professional baseball has taken a dive, Fresno baseball fans now have two new ball stadiums at Fresno State, one for men and another for women's teams. Attendanace is fair but nothing to get excited about.
Fresno City Hall has been telling taxpayers for more than three years that it wants to get a professional Baseball stadium right in the middle of the Downtown area. Its historical.
Nowadays, the Mayor and the other members of the City Council are receiving a great deal of baseball stadium developers for lunch, cards at the Club One, and so forth. Not to worry, the Mayor and the City Council have said that the City will not expend any City funds on the baseball stadium project.
Taxpayers won't have to start a recall election, afer all. Whew! "It will be 100% financed by private bonds and private financing" Mayor Patterson, 1995.
What a relief it was to hear these reassurances from Mayor Patterson. This won't be another failed City Hall gamble with somebody else's money. This won't be another Foster Farms Plant. It won't be another Tortilla Factory. It won't be another Airport Hanger. Thank God this won't be another Marie's French restaurant. Neither will it be another Dell Webb Hotel. And it certainly won't be another McCormick Barstow Law Building fiasco. And it will not be another Harrisons Motor Parts con job. Still, it might be more like the old Barrister Law Building fiasco where the City changes the terms of its agreement after the fact. What a history the City Hall has in trying to find out how to run a business and how to steward the public trust.
What with professional baseball players changing teams more often than
jockstraps, progress with a major baseball franchise in Fresno will be more like monitoring this week's trades, and attendance trends that last only through the next free agent signing. City Hall will have to learn about the professional baseball business. First, it should learn the difference between government and business.
Pre-season baseball predictions have never been very consistant or reliable. Profitability is always up for grabs.
Nowadays, they're even less so, it seems. Why, well, Mayor Patterson has changed his mind. He said in a televised statement on Friday that it is a "good idea" to advance $9,000,000.00 of tax revenues somewhere in City Hall accounts to the Diamond Group who is the Fresno baseball stadium developer. Woops!
