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Citizens ballpark panel OK'd
Interested residents should apply by end of this week
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Published: July 7, 2009
When it comes to the new downtown baseball stadium, citizens will get more of a say, the Winston-Salem City Council decided last night.
The council voted 7-0 to create an 11-person Citizens Baseball Review Committee. Council member Nelson Malloy Jr., who represents the North Ward, was absent.
Mayor Allen Joines will review applications from residents and recommend members to the council. The council hopes to appoint members at its next meeting on July 20. Joines said that, if possible, residents should apply by the end of the week.
The citizens committee will have the authority to question -- and reject -- payments from the city's loan money to the stadium. The ballpark, which is under construction at Peters Creek Parkway and First Street, will cost about $40.7 million. It will be home to the Class A Winston-Salem Dash, an affiliate of the Chicago White Sox.
Local entrepreneur Billy Prim owns both the team and the development company that is building the stadium. Construction on the stadium has been stopped for months.
The committee will:
□ Review documents related to construction.
□ Review statements, invoices and other documents related to payments from the city's loan.
□ Review developers' and contractors' reports detailing the minority-owned vendors and contractors who work on the stadium.
□ Review quarterly financial statements and attendance figures at the ballpark once it's built.
Committee members must not have conflicts of interest. No family members or people with business ties to the team, developer, mayor or anyone on the council can be appointed to the review board.
"We need to make this committee as independent and transparent as possible," Joines said.
City Attorney Angela Carmon said last night that construction on the stadium would likely begin 30 to 45 days after the city closes on its loans.
City Manager Lee Garrity said that process is taking longer than expected because the city is shopping at multiple banks for lower interest rates. Initially, he said, city officials hoped to close on the loan by the end of July, but now the beginning of August is a more realistic closing date.
Denise Bell, the city's chief financial officer, said that the delay will not affect construction.
Garrity said that some residents have questioned why the city rushed two public hearings in one week before approving the extra money for the stadium last month. The city already had given $12 million toward building the ballpark.
Garrity said the group of banks that made a different loan to Prim's development company had set the deadline for acceptance at the end of that week.
"The rush was for the private financing that the developer was getting," Garrity said. He said that if the private loan to Prim's company had fallen through, the city's loan would not have been necessary because the stadium wouldn't have been finished.
■ Laura Graff can be reached at 727-7279 or at lgraff@wsjournal.com.
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