D.C. Baseball Update

For some time now, I've been pretty conflicted over the issue of bringing the Expos to Washington. Sure, I'd love to see a baseball team in the Washington area, but we ought to be asking just what price we're willing to pay to make it happen.

As a Virignia resident, I couldn't see justifying any sort of public expenditures for a ballpark while the state was in the midst of a fiscal crisis. As for any of the proposed stadium sites on my side of the Potomac, there simply isn't any spot available in Northern Virginia that wouldn't exacerbate an already overtaxed transportation system (something both Peter White and I have noted recently).

Which leads us to the District. Because the transportation infrastructure in the Washington Metropolitan Area was designed to move government employees from the suburbs to downtown, putting a stadium there makes the most sense. The roads are there, the Metro is there, the tourists are there.

Unfortunately, given the District's history of fiscal irresponsibility, building a new ballpark would probably fall on the backs of local taxpayers -- something that's bound to make Washington a less attractive place to do business. And the plan that Mayor Anthony Williams has proposed to the D.C. City Council, but has yet to be approved (thanks to City Councilman Jack Evans), puts the onus of paying for the new stadium on businesses that are overtaxed already.

Which is why the latest post about Virginia baseball over at Distinguished Senators seems more than a little ironic. Ryan titled his post, Commonwealth of Whores, playing off the title of P.J. O'Rourke's Parliament of Whores -- an excellent read you ought to make time for.

For those who haven't read Parliament, it's all about how the Federal Government finds incredibly creative ways to waste our tax dollars. But when it comes to the question about Washington baseball, it's the officials in the District who are going to be ripping off taxpayers, while the Virginia plan announced this week doesn't commit the state to any new public expenditures in support of a stadium.

As a resident of Silver Spring, Maryland, Ryan may not care that the folks in the District are going to be asked to pay for the ballpark he so dearly wants downtown. Unfortunately, with businesses in the city taxed so heavily already, the plan he's favoring would only encourage those who are going to be asked to pay for the stadium to flee the city like so many others before them.

Want to know why Loudoun County, Virginia is the fastest growing county in the U.S.? Look no further than the absolute mess that the District has become when it comes to essential city services (public safety, sanitation, education). And it isn't just a case of Westward migration either, as the explosive growth of Prince George's County, spurred on by an exodus of the African-American middle class from the city, adequately demonstrates.

I've lived in the Washington area for 19 years. I've lived in the District (Brookland and the SW Waterfront), worked in Montgomery County, and lived for the last 13 years in Northern Virginia (Alexandria, Crystal City, McLean, Reston). After all that time, I can say one thing for sure -- life in our area has gotten significantly better everywhere, and we did it without a baseball team. In fact, we've survived 33 years without it, and we sure as Hell don't need to overpay to get one now.

So say what you want about the Virginia proposal -- at least it doesn't lean on already overburdened taxpayers to finance a stadium for multimillionaires who won't finance a ballpark out of their own deep pockets.

CORRECTION: Yesterday, I upbraided the Washington Post for not sending a reporter to the Dulles press conference announcing the details of the plan for a Virginia ballpark. Turns out I was wrong. Thanks to reader Vincent Paterno, who directed me to two pieces that appeared in the paper's Metro section yesterday. Here's the straight news story, as well as Metro columnist Marc Fisher's anti-suburban screed.

Why did I miss these two? First off, because I didn't look hard enough through the online edition. And second, because the Post neglected to include links to either piece in the Sports section of their online edition -- an oversight that they should correct in the future.

UPDATE: Is Northern Virginia big enough to support a team on its own? The one reporter in town who knows the issue better than anybody else, Eric Fisher of the Washington Times takes a look.

Eric 12:52 PM

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.ericmcerlain.com/mt/mt-tb.cgi/3385

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference D.C. Baseball Update:

» The Rundown from Bendomenech.com
Our latest addition to quotes you don't see every day: "Devika Koppikar, a spokeswoman for Cummings, said the “only reason [Cummings] went was at the request of his constituent” Bishop Joseph Showell, who was honored by Moon. She added that... [Read More]

Tracked on June 23, 2004 09:05 PM