Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, December 18, 1993 TAG: 9312180151
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RAY COX STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
"I haven't talked about baseball all day," said Bucs owner Kelvin Bowles, who said this week he was negotiating to sell the team to an out-of-town buyer. "I'm sitting here going through a pile of tax papers. I don't even have the time to get my Christmas shopping done."
Bowles said he had taken a call from another prospective buyer and that they would talk.
"If [the sale] was a done deal, would I be doing that?" he said.
Bowles repeatedly has denied reports the team has been sold. He said Friday that he expects no new developments during the weekend.
Elsewhere, talk of a new ballpark to replace antiquated Municipal Field continued. The prevailing assumption is that regardless of who owns the Bucs, time is rapidly running out on Municipal Field as a viable minor-league facility.
"We'll either have to get up to standards somehow or we're going to lose the ball team," said Salem Mayor James Taliaferro. "Nobody is under any other illusion."
Still, Taliaferro said now is not the time for the city to be looking to build a new ballpark. For one thing, he said, Salem has other priorities - renovations of its schools foremost among them. For another, Bowles' situation is too uncertain.
"We will have to wait and see what is going to happen with Kelvin Bowles and the Bucs," he said. "What we don't know is how the phantom buyer feels. Until we do know, there's no use in talking about it."
When and if a new owner appears on the scene, Taliaferro said city officials will hold those discussions.
Taliaferro said he doesn't think much of the implied threat that an out-of-town buyer might move the club because of an inadequate field.
"They may have intended to move it all along anyway," he said. "I would not vote for a park to be built by Salem or in conjunction with others predicated on the possibility that we might get a ball team in there. I don't know how the other members of [Salem's city] council feel, and I might lose 4-1, but I'm against it."
The mayor seemed cool to the idea that some sort of cooperative venture on a new ballpark with other municipalities in the valley could be worked out.
"Nobody has said anything about that," he said. "We don't have a closed-door policy nor do we have blinders on. But we do kind of like to fly our own kites in Salem, as you know. Our experience with joint commissions hasn't been that great. We proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that we've done a better job with Salem Civic Center than we ever did collectively [with other valley jurisdictions]."
According to figures provided by Bucs general manager Sam Lazzaro, the team has an annual economic impact on the Roanoke Valley of (depending on the formula used to measure it) between $2.8 and $6.8 million. It has not escaped the attention of officials outside Salem that the Bucs are an asset to the Roanoke Valley as a whole.
The possibility of a joint venture to build a stadium drew some interest this week.
"I'm sure we'd be willing to talk about it," said Roanoke County Administrator Elmer Hodge.
Roanoke City Councilman Mac McCadden said he, too, would be willing to look into such a plan, although he had doubts about how far it would go.
Taliaferro expressed his doubts about a plan McCadden proposed this week to build an $8 million multipurpose facility in downtown Roanoke.
"What all these people who propose putting everything in downtown Roanoke are overlooking is that they would be bucking a national trend," Taliaferro said. "Things aren't being put downtown anymore. The trend is to shopping malls and things like that outside of town that people can get to."
Taliaferro's preferred location for a facility, if the money ever became available to build one, would be on the lot adjoining Salem Stadium.
"It's already got everything there," he said. "The parking, water, sewer are there. From an economic standpoint, you can't beat it. We sat down and talked to Kelvin and Sam Lazzaro about that spot not too long ago. We do have some things up there [at the adjacent Salem Civic Center] during the summer, such as the Roanoke Valley Horse Show and the Salem Fair, but they assured us that they could be scheduled around with road trips."
by CNB