Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, July 21, 1994 TAG: 9408120018
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A12 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Try telling that to the Roanoke Express of the professional East Coast Hockey League. With new, marketing-oriented ownership and a better venue, the Roanoke Civic Center, both attendance and the franchise's on-ice performance zoomed this past winter.
Try telling that to the organizers of the superb Virginia Commonwealth Games and of the Youth Soccer Tournament, and to the folks who made sure that this year's Tour DuPont would bring its world-class bicyclists into the valley.
And try telling it to Salem, which is having one heckuva sports week.
On Tuesday, by a nearly 6-1 margin, Salem voters gave their OK to construction of a $5-million, 6,000-seat ballpark to house the Buccaneers of minor-league baseball's Carolina League.
On Wednesday, Salem officials announced that the NCAA Division III men's basketball Final Four and the Division III baseball World Series are expected to be played next year in Salem.
All this is in addition to the Amos Alonzo Stagg Bowl, the Division III football championship game first held in Salem this past December and scheduled for the city again this year and next, and to small-college national softball championships on line.
These are victories not only for sports-obsessed Salem, but for the entire valley. Club surveys show, for example, that only 21 percent of those attending Buccaneers baseball games are from Salem itself. Some 55 percent come from Roanoke or Roanoke County. Attendance at other sports events similarly draws from a wider region than simply the locality in which they happen to occur - another reminder that, economically and socially anyway, the valley has consolidated into a single entity.
Local government has yet to catch up with that fact, of course. But the sports successes show that progress still is possible even when local government is a partner - as it usually has to be with sports activities.
The attractions mentioned above are run by private-sector organizations, some (the Buccaneers and the Express) by for-profit businesses and others by not-for-profit associations. Local governments provide the capital facilities - including, soon, a new minor-league baseball park in Salem.
Granted, sports can't drive a local economy, can't feed, clothe and shelter thousands. The same is true of museums, the arts, green parks and mountain vistas. But in improving a community's attractiveness and liveliness, they add fuel to the sorts of engines that do drive economies.
And sports and kindred activities enrich the community in ways not always measurable in dollars and cents. It can be overdone, of course: A $50-million, 60,000-seat stadium would have been foolish. But knock a zero off each of those numbers, and for Salem - and the valley - it's a good investment for quality-of-life capital.
by CNB