City Council at the bat

On the front page of today's newspaper, in this space and in a guest editorial by Waynesboro businessman and Wayne Theatre Alliance Chairman Bill Hausrath, baseball is again the topic of the day. It is one we will continue to take up until either we hear the sweet sound of wood cracking against rawhide or all hopes for this loftily ambitious notion have been extinguished.

Should the latter prove to be the case, nothing will have been lost but a dream. Whether the magic of the great game of summer appears here is not so important as the manner in which the question is answered. If the best efforts of the relevant players in the public and private sectors fail to bring professional baseball to the 'boro, our city will not be worse off for the effort.

Defeat can only come if the city's elected officials allow developer Jim Morris' grand vision of a $20 million, 4,000-seat River City ballpark to waste away for want of interest and action. If a sense of urgency on the City Council is not inspired by a plan such as Morris', we wonder what, if anything, will provoke such a spirit.

Our point is not to suggest that Waynesboro's future hinges on a ballpark. Hausrath asks many valid questions about the prospect. Finding a suitable site and money to build the facility and navigating through the maze of bureaucratic and logistical complexities of such a project all are extraordinary challenges in a city that already faces more than a few of them, starting with fixing a broken stormwater system.

Still, we elect people not to take on opposing factions on the council or to secure TV debate time for political allies, but to make our city a better, more prosperous place. The task requires surmounting obstacles not hiding behind them.

Toward that end, Hausrath makes a particularly good point, suggesting that the city create a Ballpark Commission to examine Morris' plan. We like the idea specifically because it represents the city acting on the issue rather than ignoring it.

Our approach is similar. We submit that a strong first step would be for the council to work with city management to appoint a specific government staff member to take the point position on the baseball issue. In the business world, this person would be known as the project manager, the one responsible for providing answers and seeing an initiative through to completion.

The project manager's first step would be to determine precisely the needs of Morris and his investors. Morris has suggested splitting the construction costs between his group, the city and the state. He also has eyed land, some of it public. Finding the right space will be crucial to the deal and its effect on downtown.

While identifying the details of Morris' plan, the project manager and his team also could study the potential economic impact of minor league baseball in Waynesboro. We seldom encourage governments to add another study onto the heap of reports officialdom compiles on its own, but in this case, one would be necessary.

We are convinced that, driven by Waynesboro's unique location, a minor league ballpark could have the drawing power to turn our city into a recreational gem at the ends of two of America's most scenic routes. We imagine a city teeming with economic life, a riverfront populated by restaurants and shops, a central downtown district bustling with activity and the retail destination in the west end strengthened by the influx of visitors. We would like to see our premise tested against hard facts, which, in part, was the endeavor of our lead story today. A study would provide further clarity.

Of course, we along with interested observers such as Hausrath can opine ad infinitum, but the burden to nudge this idea forward belongs to city leaders. We look to them amid the lingering quiet downtown and ask: What say you-