Paul Matney is a diehard baseball fan.
He admits to it readily, telling audiences how — as a high school student — he used to post the scores along the outfield wall at the old Potter County Memorial Stadium.
Matney, who grew up to become president of Amarillo College, also tells the story of how he saw the great Willie Mays — yep, that Willie Mays — get picked off at second base during an exhibition game between the San Francisco Giants and the Cleveland Indians.
Matney, who’s now co-chairing a political action group called Vote FOR Amarillo, is making the case on behalf of the multipurpose event venue that’s up for a non-binding vote Nov. 3. City residents are going to decide if they want an MPEV — which includes a baseball park — built in downtown Amarillo. It’s a non-binding vote, but the City Council would commit political suicide if it went against the wishes of the voters, which makes the vote politically binding.
I got to hear Matney’s pitch once more this morning and he is as convincing as he’s been all along.
Amarillo has been a baseball town for many decades. It can be a great baseball town yet again if we build a venue that can attract the interest and attention of Major League Baseball executives looking for a place to develop a minor-league baseball affiliate.
Amarillo can be ripe for such a relationship, Matney said.
The Amarillo Thunderheads — for whom Matney moonlights as a public address announcer — is an independent non-affiliated outfit that plays in a venue that Matney said is “at the end of its life.” That’s a nice way of saying what many of us have known for a very long time: Potter County’s stadium is a dump. Why don’t more fans attend Thunderheads baseball games? Look at the place where they play.
Matney mentioned how a visiting team — on the advice of its manager and coaches — changed into its uniforms at the hotel where it was staying, rather than doing so in the visitors’ clubhouse.
The MPEV is slated to cost around $32 million. It will be paid for with revenue bonds, which will be retired through hotel/motel tax and sales tax revenue. Matney insisted yet again that “no property taxes will be used” to pay for the stadium.
He described the MPEV as a vital component to the convention hotel that is planned for downtown, along with a parking garage. The Embassy Suites hotel owner is footing the bill himself — with help from investors — for the $45 million hotel.
The parking garage feature 24,000 square feet of retail space and it will be financed through rental and parking fees.
The MPEV, baseball park — or whatever you want to call it — can become a vital component to downtown Amarillo’s rebirth. What’s more, if downtown sees an infusion of new life, the energy will ripple throughout the city.
As Matney noted, using the cliché, “A rising tide lifts all boats.”
In this case, such a saying is more than just a string of words. It speaks to the future of our city.
Play ball!