(C) Tennessee Lookout
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Stadium fatigue in Nashville clouds talk of Major League Baseball expansion – Tennessee Lookout [1]
['More From Author', 'December', 'Nicole Williams']
Date: 2023-12-18
If you thought we were done talking about stadiums in Nashville, think again.
Stadium fatigue was palpable among North Nashville residents who attended a community meeting on Tuesday night to hear an update on plans to bring Major League Baseball to Nashville.
First Horizon Park, where the minor league Nashville Sounds play, opened in 2015. Construction of Geodis Park, the stadium that houses Nashville Soccer Club, was completed less than two years ago. The Metro Council earlier this year approved a deal to build a brand-new stadium for the Tennessee Titans, to the tune of $2.1 billion.
Now, a group that calls itself Music City Baseball is ramping up efforts to make MLB happen in Nashville.
Music City Baseball formed in 2019 with the goal of securing a coveted MLB expansion team for Nashville or convincing an existing team to relocate. They’ve named their hypothetical team the Nashville Stars, paying homage to the Negro Southern League team that played under the name in the 1950s. They’ve even got merch!
To realize their dream, though, they’ll face an uphill battle with little support from community members or local elected officials.
A not-so-credible group of messengers
Residents voiced strong opposition to Music City Baseball’s plans to bring an MLB stadium to the campus of Tennessee State University.
Dubbed “Project Smoke,” the plan would include a stadium and surrounding mixed-use development. The plans contemplate housing and retail, along with a hotel to generate additional revenue.
A pitchman who pleaded guilty to Medicaid fraud and a board chair who produced “torture memos” for the George W. Bush White House may not have the most credibility to approach North Nashvillians about siting a baseball stadium in the community.
The development would be located on tens of acres of wetlands on TSU’s campus, currently used in the university’s agricultural program. Extensive environmental remediation would be required to make the acreage development-ready, and TSU would likely have to relocate existing agricultural uses.
The salesman sent to pitch this lofty vision to the community? Dr. Eddie Hamilton, a pediatrician who in 2013 pleaded guilty to a charge of healthcare fraud for inappropriate billing practices. Hamilton contested the charge, chalking it up to a misunderstanding and overzealous prosecution.
Still, it’s not a good look for a group looking to build credibility and support for their cause.
As residents socialized after the meeting, a refrain of, “Have you Googled this guy? Can you believe this?” echoed through the room.
One resident joked that Project Smoke was an appropriate name for the plan, given the amount of smoke Hamilton was blowing up residents’ rear ends.
Hamilton isn’t the only project leader to raise eyebrows. The chair of Music City Baseball is Alberto Gonzales, dean of the Belmont University School of Law. Gonzales formerly served as White House counsel to former President George W. Bush, before graduating to Attorney General. In his time as counsel to the president, Gonzales and his office produced a series of “torture memos,” arguing for the legality of so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” for detainees thought to be enemy combatants.
And this is the team we want leading the charge to turn North Nashville into the East Bank?
Long on promises and short on details
Hamilton painted a picture of a project that could build Black wealth, reinvigorate TSU’s campus, and bring downtown-level investment to North Nashville — an area largely neglected by the city for decades.
According to Hamilton, the agreement with TSU — structured as a 99-year land lease — would include a revenue-sharing component, allowing the university to benefit from revenue generated by the retail and hotel uses planned for the stadium campus.
And Hamilton assured residents that Music City Baseball has no plans to request public investment — that is, for the stadium itself. They do expect to receive public dollars for massive infrastructure upgrades to support the stadium and other uses on the campus.
Hamilton pointed to an alleged open call from Mayor Freddie O’Connell to anyone looking to bring MLB to Nashville: we won’t pay for your stadium, but we’ll offer you land, and we’ll provide funding for infrastructure.
O’Connell quickly refuted this claim, tweeting, “We are not ‘offering’ anything to anyone.”
Peppered with questions by residents, Hamilton had very few answers, opting instead to wax poetic about his broader vision for Black Nashville. More than once, residents had to reiterate questions and redirect Hamilton.
“Don’t come here giving us that jibber jabber,” said one resident. “We don’t believe anything that y’all are saying,” said another.
“I’m not buying it,” said Davie Tucker — who serves as executive director of the Metro Nashville Human Relations Commission — expressing frustration with the idea of baseball as “this magic wand that’s going to fix North Nashville.” North Nashville shouldn’t have to rely on baseball to bring infrastructure improvements and investments, Tucker argued. That’s what the government is for; it’s why we pay taxes.
Besides, resident Simone Boyd said, her neighbors don’t want a baseball stadium. They want a grocery store. They want a library. They want the basic goods and services that are afforded other areas of the city, and they shouldn’t have to cosign a plan that will “build wealth for already wealthy people” in order to get those things.
“It doesn’t always feel like TSU loves us”
Another topic of contention was TSU’s potential involvement. Hamilton seems to believe that North Nashvillians would be thrilled with the rough outlines of an imaginary plan that could maybe, if you squint hard enough, fill the $2 billion hole in TSU’s budget caused by historical underinvestment from the state.
He was mistaken.
“We love TSU,” said Boyd, “but it doesn’t always feel like TSU loves us.” As other residents vigorously nodded along, Boyd recounted a list of TSU’s sins against its neighbors. TSU President Dr. Glenda Glover accepted a position on the board of private prison giant CoreCivic in 2021, before quickly backtracking after huge backlash from the community. Glover and head football coach Eddie George were among the first in line to sing the praises of the new Titans stadium.
Another resident bemoaned the involvement of Rep. Harold Love, Jr., D-Nashville, who apparently gave Music City Baseball the idea to approach TSU for this private-public partnership. “Harold Love hasn’t done anything for this community,” the resident complained.
Hamilton came with the wrong message for the wrong crowd. He couldn’t do anything but watch as his dreams of building an army of neighborhood supporters went up in flames.
Be serious
Councilmember Brandon Taylor, who hosted the community meeting, said his goal was to promote transparency. He wanted the public to be aware of where the plans — as flimsy as they may be — stand.
Taylor feels the same way about public dollars for sports stadiums as he did during the debate over a new Titans stadium: he’s not interested. In calling the meeting, he hoped to quell rumors that MLB is in the city’s near-term future.
It’s clear the baseball group has a long way to go. They say they have the billions of dollars it will take to make it happen, but they can’t tell us where they’re getting the money. They say TSU is on board, but they don’t have a signed agreement. They say they’ll get infrastructure money from the city, but the mayor says, “not so fast.”
Unless the state chips in — which they’ll likely be loath to do after just handing Nashville $500 million for the new Titans stadium — or O’Connell completely betrays his base, Project Smoke doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell.
As the meeting neared its end, Boyd made an exasperated plea to Hamilton: “Just be serious!”
After Tuesday night, I think we can safely say that this plan is about as unserious as it gets.
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[1] Url:
https://tennesseelookout.com/2023/12/18/stadium-fatigue-in-nashville-clouds-talk-of-major-league-baseball-expansion/
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