What’s in a name?
I admit that last week, I had a bit of a knee-jerk reaction in writing about the brouhaha surrounding the possible name change of the new arena downtown.
What I wrote is certainly still true in my mind and while it certainly was in the public interest, perhaps it was not headline material.
Never for a second did I think that the Coliseum Authority was going to take James Brown’s name off the entire arena complex. The real point I was trying to make was that it was boneheaded on the part of the authority not to get out in front of the story before it broke the local internet.
I absolutely stand by that assessment.
The information that got out started as an innocent comment made in the last Finance Committee meeting. But the fact is that the Coliseum Authority was already shopping around a corporate name for the new arena and this appears to have been the plan all along, so it really shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone.
Every arena, amphitheater and sports venue worth its salt has a corporate sponsor that pays for the right to have their name or logo prominently placed at the site. Corporations pay top dollar, we are talking up to and over $1 million a year to have their name emblazoned on a public entertainment facility. This money is there to “take up the slack” on years when ticket sales decline or be stashed away for future improvements and maintenance.
This is, I am learning, has become a common practice across the nation.
Local radio show host, Austin Rhodes, got wind of the sponsor search and broadcast it and before you knew it, the Godfather’s daughter, the lovely Deanna Brown-Thomas, as well as the company that owns James Brown’s name and likeness, Primary Wave, got involved as well. A movement to “save the name” got started, only, there is really not a name to save. The Coliseum Authority is not taking James Brown’s name off of the complex, they are only selling the corporate naming rights to the arena itself.
That fact changes everything.
Now, I am not saying that those listed above were floating a rumor, or making a mountain out of a molehill, it was a fact that was just becoming known.
Still, the Coliseum Authority didn’t offer up a press release to explain what was going on, and, as you know, water in a pot boils from the bottom.
Before long, the politicians got involved.
I think Commissioner Al Mason maybe spent too much time recovering from surgery and out of the limelight, because he felt it necessary to veer Tuesday’s commission meeting off course with a presentation that included soaring rhetoric along with a video.
All Mason needed was a choir behind him doing somersaults as he preached and it would have been the perfect reenactment of James Brown’s minister scene out of “The Blues Brothers.”
“You got the iconic, the legendary, world renowned, the godfather of soul, the hardest working man in show business, soul brother number one, James Brown who performed for kings and queens…He put Augusta, Ga. on the map before the Augusta National ever did,” Mason pontificated, blissfully unaware that James Brown hadn’t been born yet when Bobby Jones won his “grand slam.”
I was waiting for someone to come out and enshroud Mason with a glittering cape.
Before I knew it, former Mayor Bob Young was advocating that the commission fire and replace the Coliseum Authority.
Isn’t that taking it a little far?
You may have noticed that TAP’s editorial board, of which I am a member, presented an editorial backing the Coliseum Authority’s attempts to find a corporate sponsor. It just makes good financial sense, and it doesn’t mean that James Brown won’t still be honored as part of the complex’s name; the authority is just attempting to find any income stream possible to keep the new arena solvent, and the folks from Primary Wave, while being generous with the licensing fees aren’t writing a check to promote the Godfather.
Our editorial board has to reach a unanimous consensus for an editorial to be produced. So, yes, in a way, my opinion on the matter changed somewhat.
I am man enough to admit when I am wrong, er mistaken. I was mistaken.
To go as far as to call for the Coliseum Authority to be disbanded over this is pure grandstanding and kind of a slap in the face to a body that has proven to be one of the few boards that are actually getting things done correctly and benefiting the taxpayers.
I have known Brad Usry for many years, and before that I knew his father. I was a kid, but every kid from Augusta from the 50s through the 80s knew Mr. Horace Usry, the original Fat Man.
I know for a fact that Brad Usry inherited his dad’s work ethic.
Brad, who is older than me, is not a restaurant owner who walks around chatting up customers and inspecting plates as they come out of the kitchen, everyday he is back in the kitchen with the staff cooking. The last time I spoke with him, he was unloading the food truck. If you have ever unloaded a restaurant food truck, then you know what real work is.
No, Brad and his colleagues on the authority are not trying to pull the wool over anyone’s eyes and it is unfair to throw poison darts at them for trying to save the taxpayers some money, even though they were bone-heads for not coming out and explaining the deal before it became a big deal.
Annexation in Columbia County causes strong feelings
One thing that has been common among governments since humankind invented them is that they seek to grow, constantly looking to enlarge in both size and influence.
History lovers will remember reading that at the end of the American Revolution, the British did not just cede over the land that were once their chartered colonies, but they also turned over all claims they had on the North American wilderness west of the colonies, the area known as “Indian Territory.”
At the time, everyone knew that the United States would not remain in its current borders for long. George Washington knew it, but he was too busy fighting whiskey rebellions to worry about expansion.
It wouldn’t be long before President Thomas Jefferson doubled the size of the U.S. with his pen, and by the end of the 19th Century, America would claim everything from sea to shining sea.
The reason I used that preface is that the Columbia County commission almost gave an engraved invitation to interested parties to seize county land by starting the conversation about incorporating the county, commissioning a study, then leaving it to a non-binding referendum without immediately proceeding forward.
The city of Harlem has always had the ability to annex land, all I am saying is that rather than use their study as justification to go ahead and incorporate, the county leadership sat on its hands and Harlem officials, knowing it will eventually happen, seized the opportunity while they still had time.
So, Harlem decided to annex the land after the owner(s) requested it, put the matter before the public on at least two occasions and that still left jaws dropping on the Columbia County commission. Twenty-years ago, heck, just ten years ago, that land wasn’t really worth all that much. But with the expansion of Fort Gordon and Amazon among others, land in Columbia County is at a premium.
“How in the world did you guys find out about this before us?” One official in the county asked me. Well, we sent our reporter Skyler Andrews out to cover the meetings and he wrote a story about it. Duh.
Why wouldn’t Harlem want to suck up a nice portion of taxable land knowing that the county will be on the hook to still provide utility services?
So, now there is a little war brewing in Columbia County. I am getting calls from both sides and the conversation always starts with, “You didn’t hear this from me, but…”
My favorite conspiracy theory so far is that Harlem is “inland-island-hopping,” and the plan is to continue to annex until they can eventually govern a stretch of I-20 and can set up speed traps on the interstate.
Perhaps the commission may learn a lesson that sometimes leadership means doing what you think is right, rather than allowing everything to be up to a democratic vote among the citizens. Sometimes, it is better to take the political barbs that may come your way in doing what is best for your constituents than to allow them to muddy the waters with their opinion.
On the bright side, maybe the boundary war will take the attention off the poor beleaguered library board for a short spell.
Speaking of Columbia County
Bond Golf Global has announced that golf is coming back to Jones Creek. According to a press release, all 18 holes of the old course, which was originally designed by the legendary Rees Jones and was enhanced with updates by Tom Fazio, will reopen.
The organization did not list a “grand reopening” date, but the driving range remains open, the clubhouse has undergone a full renovation and memberships are being sold now.
This is really good news. I grew up in Jones Creek and have fond memories of my teenage years there.
When it opened, Jones Creek had such great potential. It had the pedigree with its arms-length association with Bobby Jones, but somehow, it never got the prestige it deserved. Despite the hard work put in by Sean Frantom and the staff there, the course was always looked upon like Westlake’s red-headed-stepchild younger sibling.
It didn’t help that the restaurant could have become Columbia County’s rival to Raes Coastal Cafe, but it suffered early on from poor management and one failed restaurant concept after another. By the time the real restauranters tried to make a go of it, the place had a horrible reputation. Even my mother complained one day at lunch, “If they’re going to charge $15 for a club sandwich, they might put something in it other than bread and lettuce!”
Of course, the war of the water with Columbia County ultimately doomed the club and here’s to hoping we don’t see a return of that boondoggle.
Growing up in Jones Creek was fun. We moved in when I was 16 and ours was one of the first homes constructed in McKinnes Park. My high school years all the way to the time I was set loose out on the world was spent in Jones reek.
Yes, I got in trouble one time for taking my Toyota Tercel out on the cart paths for the sheer juvenile fun of it.
Back in those days, there was only one giant house at the end of Michael’s Creek, so that desolate stretch became the local lover’s lane; meanwhile, Park Chase consisted of a sign and nothing else, so it was the perfect place to park and, well, just be teenagers.
The cul-de-sac at the end of Park Chase sat the remnants of an old barn and that’s where all of us who had cars would congregate on weekend nights. Instead of wasting gas by cruising up and down Washington Road from West Town to the Sidetrack Grill parking lot and back, we parked at the end of Park Chase and took turns blaring tunes by Def Leppard and this “new” band everyone else in the country was just finding out about: REM.
Yes, there was the occasional Boone’s Farm bottle to be seen, but we never got into any trouble because we were smart enough not to draw attention to ourselves. Even on the few occasions when the music got a little loud and someone called in a noise complaint, we were as courteous as Eddie Haskell to the cops and we were never cited for anything.
It probably helped that cell phone cameras and social media didn’t exist in those days!
Scott Hudson is the Senior Investigative Reporter, Editorial Page Editor and weekly columnist for The Augusta Press. Reach him at scott@theaugustapress.com
