Eugene weekly., March 21, 2024, Page 5, Image 5

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THE CURRENT DESIGN FOR LANE COUNTY’S
PROPOSED MULTI-USE FACILITY THAT WOULD
HOUSE THE EMS AND IS EXPECTED TO SEAT OVER
4,500 AND COST $90.5 MILLION.
Image provided by Allan Benavides
The Ems Are
Pitching a Stadium
THE MINOR LEAGUE BASEBALL TEAM SEEKS MILLIONS IN PUBLIC
MONEY TO CONSTRUCT A NEW BASEBALL STADIUM AT THE LANE
EVENTS CENTER. EUGENE’S PORTION IS ON THE BALLOT IN MAY.
By Bentley Freeman
T
he Eugene Emeralds, the city’s minor
league baseball team for the past 70
years, says it’s going to leave town if
it doesn’t secure funding for a new
stadium by June 1.
And the team wants taxpayers —
in Eugene, Lane County and across
Oregon — to pick up virtually all of the $90.5 million cost.
In May, Eugene voters will decide if they will tax them-
selves to give the team what it wants, or if the Ems’ ulti-
matum is too expensive for the promised rewards of
keeping the team here.
The Ems currently play in the University of Oregon’s
PK Park, their home fi eld since 2010, after leaving historic
Civic Stadium, where they had played since 1969. But the
team is being squeezed out of PK Park, both because
E U G E N E W E E K LY . C O M
of the team’s busier schedule and requirements from
Major League Baseball (the Ems are an affi liate of the
San Francisco Giants) that call for stadiums to have more
features than PK Park now off ers.
Since 2021, the Ems have put on a major PR campaign
for a new stadium, telling their fans and city offi cials that
the team needs an answer about a new stadium by June
1, or they need to start looking for a new home city.
Eugene Ems General Manager Allan Benavides desper-
ately wants to keep the Emeralds in Eugene. “The Ems
have been in Eugene longer than the Giants in San Fran-
cisco,” he says. “Our goal is to stay here.”
The proposal for the 4,500-seat multi-use stadium is
complicated and is still missing key details. We’ve off ered
answers to some of the basic questions that face the Ems,
local elected offi cials, and voters.
What’s the Rush?
A series of MLB requirements and a tighter
schedule are big drivers for the Ems’ call for
a new stadium.
In 2020, the Emeralds were invited to
become a High-A affi liate of the San Francisco
Giants. Since then, the number of games in their
season almost doubled to 132 from late April
to early August. The Emeralds rescheduled
six home games last summer to out-of-town
stadiums because PK Park was hosting the
Ducks super regional games.
MLB regulations require stadiums to have
locker rooms for home and away teams, and
ones that accommodate women athletes, plus
an additional locker room for coaches. PK
Park’s single locker room will no longer cut it.
When the Ducks baseball team is playing in
their stadium, the Emeralds get pushed out.
“For a third of our season, our team isn’t in a
locker room,” Benavides says. “For a third of
the season, the visiting team is in trailers.”
Who’s Paying For It?
The plan cobbles together funding from a wide range
of public sources — while only a small part of the invest-
ment comes from the Ems and their Chicago-based
owner, Elmore Sports Group.
The stadium will be owned by the county on the current
site of the Lane Events Center, aka the Fairgrounds.
The Fairgrounds’ Livestock Arena will be razed to make
room for it.
Final construction costs may very well exceed the $100
million projection made in March 2023. Lane County
Operations Director Lorren Blythe says the $90.5 million
estimate may be out of date. The “reliability of the esti-
mate is unknown due to the amount of time that has
passed since the estimate was initially provided,” Blythe
said in a March 12 meeting
So what accounts for the cost?
The land itself, to start with. Blythe says the county
land represents $9 million of the cost. And that’s the fi rst
investment the public will make — donating the land.
State lawmakers have approved $15 million. State Sen.
James Manning, a Eugene Democrat, has been a major
booster and says it’s important for local offi cials to know
that the state has what he calls “skin in the game.” The
state money will be delivered only if local offi cials and
Eugene voters approve the plan.
“This is a once in a generation project,” Manning says.
The Ems secured $1.5 million from the Federal Imme-
diate Occupancy program in exchange for the stadium’s
use as an emergency shelter when needed. (The stadium
will keep emergency supplies and shelters on hand for
use in the stadium at a moment's notice.) The Ems’ Bena-
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