Dear Editor,
As great as Augusta is, the city still has a number of elephants in the room.
I’d like to address one of them today – the elephant in the ballpark.
Through some extremely poor business decisions we have not only lost access to our beautiful baseball park on the lake but very likely may lose the asset altogether. Two years of neglect are taking a toll.
The ballpark is owned by the people of Augusta; let’s not lose sight of that. The city commissioners turned it over to the Richmond County Economic Development Authority, which in turn gave control to promoters C4 for a concert venue. Since all that transferring took place, we now have neither a ballpark nor a concert venue.
The whole affair is in litigation, with lots of fingers being pointed. In the meantime, the people’s multimillion dollar asset has been left to neglect and deterioration.
We cannot allow this sad state to continue. It’s beyond time for someone in authority to show some leadership.
It’s easy to lay out an excuse: “It’s in litigation, so we can’t do anything.” To that, I say: “Let’s save our stadium, lawyers be damned!”
The city should unilaterally take necessary steps to bring the facility up to code and return it to a safe, inviting and family-friendly environment. The stadium should be returned to the list of properties the city has for public use, whether as a ballpark, dog park, pickle ball park, or even a FEMA trailer park for the homeless.
The courts can clean up the legal mess, but the city must act on its own to clean up the physical mess. A lack of action – or interest – will simply give us another Boat House, and we know how that turned out.
Who’s willing to step up?
Bob Young
