Vancouver is no longer the only city in the region with minor league baseball on the brain.
At a Milwaukie City Council meeting last night, officials introduced an idea to the public that they said had been brewing behind the scenes for some time. That idea, according to Milwaukie City Council President Greg Chairmov, is to build a multi-use facility for a minor league baseball team on eight acres of industrial land close to the Portland-Milwaukie light rail corridor.
“We have identified a piece of property within the city that would be suitable for a ballpark,” explained Chairmov. “It has a historic building that currently is not being used and the rest of the property is used as essentially a storage yard by the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT). ODOT has indicated its willingness to sell the property to us for use as a baseball site, assuming that we can also help them relocate to another suitable facility for their storage yard.”
Does this mean Milwaukie is after the Yakima Bears? Not quite, according to Chairmov.
“We’re not trying to lure the Bears away from Vancouver, but we would like to have a minor league baseball team playing in our community,” he said. “We think having a healthy rivalry with a team in Vancouver would be wonderful.”
When asked about Milwaukie’s interest in baseball, K.L. Wombacher, general manager for the Yakima Bears, said he knew the city wanted a team, but the Bears still prefer Vancouver.
“We actually met with them in January, so we know there is interest on the other side of the river but we elected to focus on Vancouver for the last seven months just because we really like the city,” Wombacher explained. “We saw ourselves living in Vancouver. We thought we could fit well with the community and how family-friendly it is and thought it would be a great fit.”
While Milwaukie may not be gunning for the Yakima Bears franchise, Chairmov said his fellow city council members have been monitoring the situation in Clark County.
“We’re certainly watching what Vancouver is doing and trying to learn from that experience,” said Chairmov. “I think we’re all hopeful that Vancouver will succeed because we think that will be a benefit to everyone and so far it seems like the folks in Vancouver are going about things rather smartly.”
Even with the support of its city council, Milwaukie likely faces an uphill battle in getting a team to relocate there, according to Wombacher. One issue the city would have to overcome is a Minor League Baseball rule that says you can’t have teams in adjacent counties – that’s a problem considering Milwaukie sits in Clackamas County and borders Marion County, where the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes play. Additionally, Wombacher said he doesn’t know of any other teams that are willing to relocate.
“The issue is what other team would move?” asked Wombacher. “We’re the only team in the league that has expressed an interest in relocating.”
When asked about team interest, Chairmov said Milwaukie would likely need to work with a local ownership group that would be interested in buying a team and moving it here. But before that can begin, he said the city still needs to finalize a property deal with ODOT as well as figure out how a new stadium would be funded.
“There’s no question that we’re going to have to ask our residents to help pay for a portion of it,” said Chairmov. “The ones we’ve talked to so far have been enthusiastic about doing that.”
As the project moves forward, Chairmov said he hopes to follow Vancouver’s lead in getting the message out that baseball is good for the economy.
“Having a team is a great benefit for a community in any number of ways,” said Chairmov. “It’s just a plain fun thing to do, it’s a good family activity and it will help bring in new businesses.”
