Article

Sox-centric land swap fails in a county vote


By Doug Sword

Published: Wednesday, July 23, 2008 at 5:52 a.m.
Last Modified: Wednesday, July 23, 2008 at 6:17 a.m.
SARASOTA COUNTY -

A three-way land swap to bring the Boston Red Sox to Sarasota fell apart on Tuesday when county commissioners voted to reject Twin Lakes Park as a possible site for a relocated fairgrounds.

STAFF PHOTO / DAN WAGNER
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Neighbors of Twin Lakes Park complained that bringing the fair there would also bring noise and traffic and displace Little League ballfields.
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The decision appeared to make less likely than ever a deal to move the fairgrounds -- not just to Twin Lakes but anywhere -- to make room for a spring-training facility on Fruitville Road.

There could still be an effort to find land to the east along Clark, Fruitville or Bee Ridge roads for a new home for the fair.

"It's not dead, but it's not doing well," Commissioner Nora Patterson said of the prospect of getting the 98-acre property on Fruitville for a ballpark.

Even if the fair cannot be moved, the baseball deal can still happen.

The fairgrounds was always Plan A, but the city and county are scouting at least four other possible sites, including Ed Smith Stadium, bayfront land that had been set aside for a city cultural-arts district, industrial property along Central Avenue and a fourth site they have declined to discuss publicly.

While the search continues, the Red Sox are waiting to see a deal.

"Is 12th Street good enough?" asked County Commissioner Paul Mercier, referring to the site of Ed Smith Stadium. "I've said from Day 1 it is."

Also Tuesday, county commissioners pulled the plug, at least temporarily, on a committee appointed to explore the fair's future. The committee was formed early this year with a tentative budget of $400,000 to study how the fairgrounds might be redeveloped. It was this committee that had asked the Fair Board to consider a $13 million offer to move to Twin Lakes.

John Dowd, chairman of the committee, the Fruitville Property Study Group, recommended that the panel be shut down in the wake of the failure of the Twin Lakes proposal. But County Commission Chair Shannon Staub opposed eliminating the committee outright. "If you could all just sort of take a vacation," she suggested.

Commissioners voted 5-0 to rescind the offer to move the fair to Twin Lakes Park, the home of both Little League baseball and a Baltimore Oriole's minor league operation. Staub said commissioners had received 250 e-mails from neighborhoods around the park, almost all against the fair moving there.

"Wonderful," was the reaction from Beverly Gilbert, a Twin Lakes resident who was watching for Internet updates from her home Tuesday.

"It wasn't that we were all against the Red Sox; we just didn't want to lose our park," Gilbert said.

Residents worried that the fair could have displaced Little League and soccer fields and brought noise and traffic. They had planned to hold a neighborhood meeting Thursday.

"I can tell you right now we could have filled 200 seats," Gilbert said.

Staub apologized for upsetting Clark Road residents over the proposal, but tried to put the last few weeks in a good light.

"Just think how many nice people we met through e-mails," she said.

Red Sox, city and county officials have been talking since April about the team possibly moving to Sarasota from its current home in Fort Myers. The talks involve the team moving here in 2011. The Cincinnati Reds play their final spring-training season in Sarasota next year.

County commissioners meet today, but then take their annual August recess. In the meantime, County Administrator Jim Ley and his staff are empowered to bargain, within limits set Tuesday, with the Red Sox.

Commissioners favor moving toward entering an exclusivity agreement with the Red Sox, during which the city, county and team would negotiate only with each other.

Commissioners also indicated which taxpayer dollars they might support as part of a financial package for the Red Sox and which ones they would oppose.

There was general agreement that the county would not support using property taxes to pay the perhaps $80 million cost of a new spring-training facility.

Commissioner Nora Patterson said she also would oppose any "shell game" that tried to get around that prohibition, including an idea to fund part of a stadium's cost through a tax-increment financing district. The city has estimated that $10 million could be raised from property taxes from new development spurred around a new stadium. A TIF district would capture taxes from any new construction lured by a stadium.

Commissioner Joe Barbetta said the search for a new place for the fair should continue, but that the Fair Board needs to better define what it wants.

"That doesn't mean there isn't another site," Barbetta said of the elimination of Twin Lakes as a home for the fair.

Others expressed frustration toward the Fair Board, which responded to the county's offer of $13 million and 40-plus acres at Twin Lakes Park by letter last week. The letter did not say whether that offer was adequate. Instead, it said that the Fair Board needed more assurances that the new site would work, and that discussing a move to Twin Lakes would be pointless without those assurances.

On Tuesday, study group chairman Dowd said the Fair Board was not interested in bargaining, only in finding ways to avoid making a deal.

Mercier's frustration was over years of failed talks about big development projects at the prime property in which one party, the Fair Board or the county, would balk.

"I've sat here for eight years and if I hear from the Fair Board representative 'win-win' one more time, I'll go crazy," Mercier said.

Fair Board President Rory Martin could not be reached Tuesday afternoon for comment.

The Herald-Tribune is owned by the New York Times Co. The Times has a 17.5 percent stake in New England Sports Ventures, which owns the Boston Red Sox, and 80 percent of New England Sports Network, a cable network that televises Sox games.

Staff writer Roger Drouin contributed to this report.


This story appeared in print on page A1

Comments

  1. madmax295 says...
    July 23, 2008 5:04:57 am

    RE: Well now that the Fruitville Road property has been eliminated for the time being, I see that the committee to study improving that property wants to quit. Seems the only time they are interested in improving it is when it accompanies a baseball team. I can see why the fairboard members don't deal.
    Also, why the comment that they would still be looking to move the fair? If the property isn't going to be used for the proposed baseball stadium, why the everlasting desire to move the fair? Why can't the fair stay where it is and the property be used for other things as well? Could someone please explain why no one seems to be willing to work in conjunction with the fairboard to improve the property?
    still confused Mad Max
    http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20080723/ARTICLE/807230381

  2. srqcircus says...
    July 23, 2008 5:09:51 am

    RE: http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20080723/ARTICLE/807230381

    "I've sat here for eight years and if I hear from the Fair Board representative 'win-win' one more time, I'll go crazy," Mercier said.

    Eight years? WOW
    The Fair has existed since the twenty?s. The reason Mercier doesn't want to hear win - win is because the County only has a win in mind. They don't care if the Fair loses. Maybe the County should have stepped up over the years to help the Fair Board property financially. Then they might have a little more influence over the use. I know the fair has been at that site since the fifties - I've been going there since then. If you don't remember Texas Jim's then please step away from the podium. Put Baseball where it belongs, Ed Smith Stadium (or Payne Park). Leave the fair alone. They didn't ask for this. If someone decided your property had a better use then your home and asked you to vacate to a rental, what would you tell them?

  3. CuriousJoe says...
    July 23, 2008 5:13:01 am

    Madmax,

    As an observation, it seems that the fair offends the sensibilities of the good people down town. It is all about control. Those ag guys have it- the downtown crowd wants it.

    I couldn't imagine that the anyone that was in the situation such as the fair would turn down a legitimate offer of help in a cooperative spirit. In reading some of the public documents (minutes, emails, SHT reports, etc..), it seems every effort is tied with minimizing, eliminating, governance change, or moving the fair. Why doesn't someone take what the fair offers and build upon it?

  4. madmax295 says...
    July 23, 2008 5:44:22 am

    to Navarre76: that's a very good comment. North Port is in dire straits right now. They could use a shot in the arm....they have lots of land that would probably be appropriate for a stadium. It seems that there is no thinking outside the box on this.
    Mad Max

  5. madmax295 says...
    July 23, 2008 5:46:38 am

    to curiousjoe: beats me Joe.
    Mad Max

  6. herald says...
    July 23, 2008 5:51:10 am

    Well, let's see. The Fair Board has let the buildings they control fall into disrepair. They don't have a clear mission. Are they an agricultural annual fair, or do they want to be in the event planning and facilities rental business? Anything they have ever presented to the County is the Fair getting money from the County for new facilities and the Fair retaining control over the entire property and buildings. They have no real assets, except for the buildings on what I think is 8 acres they own. They just hold onto 90 acres which according to their own tax returns generates a total of about $1.2 million a year in revenue. They have proved they're not competent to maintain what they have. Why would it be in the public's interest to fund this private organization with no accountability or control over their spending? The went ahead on their own and spent about $250 thousand on consultants a few years ago to draw up some huge plan for a hotel and arena. Then went to the County when they ran out of money to continue the process. Are they developers or an agricultural fair association? So far, they haven't shown that they're good at doing either one. If the property was owned by a commercial business, similar to the Sarasota Bradenton Int. Conv. Center by the airport, it would be paying taxes. So, they have a subsidy in the form of tax free property. The Hyatt pays taxes and rents out their ballroom, so does the Ritz, so does the SBIC. I say the county should find them some land out east where they can hold the fair with minimal required buildings to hold the actual agricultural parts of the fair. They don't need and shouldn't be running an arena like Robart's. Leave that up to a for profit business that would pay taxes. At least if the County sold off 20 acres of the property for commercial development of a hotel, shops and restaurants as part of a stadium there would be tax money coming in to the tune of hundreds of thousands a year that we're not getting now.

  7. srqcircus says...
    July 23, 2008 5:54:53 am

    To Navarre76You're missing the point here. Moving the Red Sox anywhere except the fair grounds (of maybe a couple of less desirable locations) would cut the City out. Now does everyone see why they want the fair property?

  8. SRQTom says...
    July 23, 2008 6:05:52 am

    Why do the stories on the Red Sox always fail to mention anything about what is going on in Ft. Myers to keep the team there? Baseball is notorious for stringing along a city with the hopes of landing a team as a way of gaining negotiating leverage to get a better deal where they are. The people in St. Pete know all about this. How do we know this isn't just a big put on? Is Ft. Myers taking this lying down? It would be nice to get the full story.

  9. Shipette says...
    July 23, 2008 6:50:38 am

    I've been following the story in the Ft. Myers papers:

    http://www.news-press.comThere were also some quotes from http://www.naplesnews.com/
    but I don't have time to look them up right now.

    In a nutshell:
    - the spokesperson for the Red Sox say they never mentioned leaving, that Sarasota approached them, so they are willing to hear what we offer. All they want is a new stadium just like the one they have up "nawth"

    - their commissioners are promising to come up with the money somehow, but they have already maxed out their bedtax, so have to be creative with funding.

    - several posters to their forum think any new money should go to maintaining police, schools, roads, etc not wasted on a ball team for one month a year.

    - the real estate economy is a mirror of ours, foreclosures at a national high, no construction, shrinking tax base for govt services.

  10. bccsmcaha says...
    July 23, 2008 6:53:38 am

    Ha-I love it! The Fair board wants assurances about Twin Lakes. What assurances? That they can lose money there too?

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