{"id":22468,"date":"2017-06-19T23:53:11","date_gmt":"2017-06-19T23:53:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=22468"},"modified":"2017-06-19T23:53:11","modified_gmt":"2017-06-19T23:53:11","slug":"more-downtown-construction-at-hand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=22468","title":{"rendered":"More downtown construction at hand?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/MPEV.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-19442\" src=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/MPEV-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/MPEV-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/MPEV.jpg 630w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Amarillo&#8217;s brand new City Council is going to make an announcement Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>I am waiting with bated breath.<\/p>\n<p>The council members might have some big news to share regarding the future of the city&#8217;s effort to remake, reshape, revive and re-create its downtown business\/entertainment district.<\/p>\n<p>That long-awaited multipurpose event venue might be coming closer to reality.<\/p>\n<p>The city&#8217;s Local Government Corporation has been negotiating with San Antonio business officials about how to relocate that city&#8217;s Double A baseball franchise to Amarillo. The LGC has made it clear that it wouldn&#8217;t proceed with MPEV construction until it strikes a deal with some franchise to occupy the venue.<\/p>\n<p>I am acutely aware that a number of soreheads are going to gripe about it. They complain about the escalating cost of the ballpark. Amarillo voters approved a non-binding referendum in November 2015; the MPEV cost was listed at $32 million on the ballot measure. The price tag has escalated to around $45 million.<\/p>\n<p>My own hope is that the price of the ballpark doesn&#8217;t go much greater than its current level.<\/p>\n<p>The council, though, has taken great strides already in the redevelopment of the downtown district. That five-star hotel is nearing completion; we&#8217;ve seen that parking garage go up.<\/p>\n<p>Amarillo doesn&#8217;t have any kind of organized baseball activity occurring this spring and summer, which I am sure upsets the city&#8217;s baseball fan base. The MPEV, though, would play host to a number of other activities, which would jazz up the nightlife in the city&#8217;s long-slumbering central district.<\/p>\n<p>My hopes have gone up, slumped, gone up again and then receded. As of this moment, I am once again cautiously optimistic we are going to get some good news.<\/p>\n\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Amarillo&#8217;s brand new City Council is going to make an announcement Wednesday. I am waiting with bated breath. The council members might have some big news to share regarding the future of the city&#8217;s effort to remake, reshape, revive and re-create its downtown business\/entertainment district. That long-awaited multipurpose event venue might be coming closer to &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=22468\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">More downtown construction at hand?<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,17],"tags":[288,290,3153],"class_list":["post-22468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","category-sports-news","tag-amarillo-city-council","tag-amarillo-city-hall","tag-mpev"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22468"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22470,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22468\/revisions\/22470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}