The latest news about the Florida Marlins’ quest for a new ballpark.

Quick disclaimer: As we’ve heard now, the ballpark is not finalized so read this post as if the future has already happened. I’m wondering if the Marlins’ strategy is to just act like it’s a done deal so when someone in Miami tries to block it they will look bad.

OK, back to the future:

The official Marlins website is starting a twice monthly series where Dave Samson will talk about our beautiful new ballpark. The first such report discusses the detail in which HOK and a design committee made of of people from the city, county and the Marlins are reviewing the plans:

“We’ve spent many hours going from room-to-room with HOK, and figuring out exactly what is happening with the stadium,” Samson said. “We’re looking at different seating areas. How the offices are going to look. How the suites are going to look. How the clubhouses are going to look. How the press boxes are going to look. Literally, we’re going room-by-room from the top level of the stadium, all the way to the bottom. That’s taking up a lot of our time right now.”

The ballpark will likely include a downtown view (which, BTW, will ensure the sun is not in the hitters’ eyes) and will attempt to integrate Little Havana with the downtown. We’ve all heard the design will be ultra-modern/artistic, but looks like the environment inside will try to capture old-school Cuba:

“We want to have the culture of Miami. For example, we can picture having a place to drink coffee, a place to smoke cigars, a place to have Cuban food. It’s really to capture the diversity of our population. We want something for everyone.”

We’ll see. Anyway, feel free to spam Dave with your ballpark ideas at D.Samson@flamarlins.com. DS — when are you going to write us back??

Now back to reality.

We’ve previously discussed the concern that the Ballpark may be facing obstacles at the County level. Now comes word from Bob DuPuy that this is potentially a real problem:

DuPuy said “the coalition at county commission level is tenuous” for the Florida Marlins’ proposed new ballpark.

The City and County did a great job trying to ram the ballpark through as quickly as possible but it’s clear that some politicians are ready to sink this ship. I don’t know if they are sincere in their concerns or merely grandstanding for cheap political tricks but it’s time to pick sides.

Consider me worried.

One day, Miami-Dade will stop voting on the ballpark and just move forward. Apparently, the County has two more votes to go (ugh!) by July first and Commissioner Joe Martinez says there is not enough support.

“You need nine votes” to pass the ballpark management and construction agreements “and you don’t have nine votes,” Commissioner Joe A. Martinez warned commissioners Tuesday during a discussion of how stadium police and fire protection would be divided among the City of Miami and the county.

He sites his vote along with that of Javier Souto, Carlos Gimenez, and Katy Sorenson and that a two-thirds vote is need to pass the deal.

Martinez then continued to tell us how much money is being wasted already

“It’s going to come back and bite us,” Mr. Martinez said about the money the city and team are spending, because if no stadium deal is completed by Aug. 31, the city, the county and the Marlins are to share those out-of-pocket costs equally.

Let’s just hope that this rhetoric is nothing more than alot of noise from one guy.

Officials from the City and Miami and Miami-Dade County have finally agreed on how and who will police and protect the new ballpark. In what was reminiscent of an old-school Chicago-style labor dispute,the city and county negotiated this issue under pressure and threats from the police and fire unions who were trying to maximize over-time and other benefits (um… that sounds more like the Sopranos, but anyway).

The agreement states that:

- County police are to provide off-duty staffing within the stadium and within about 100 feet of the park for baseball events, and the city is to staff other areas, including the garage, retail and commercial development and a planned soccer stadium.

- City police are to staff the surrounding neighborhood and streets during ballgames.

- The city and county are each to provide one fire-rescue unit for ballgames.

There are mixed responses coming from the unions:

Members of the county’s police and fire-rescue union told commissioners the agreement was equitable, but not Armando Aguilar, president of Miami’s Fraternal Order of Police.

“We have not agreed to this,” he told the commission.

Despite that, the pact was approved and this issue is resolved.

Marlins owner Jeffery Loria was acessible to the media yesterday which meant we the fans get some more insight into what’s going on with our beloved team. I think many people spend far too much time speculating about what Loria is doing and often they are wrong.

Talking about his current roster and future payroll plans, Loria said:

“I’m not asking for patience,” Loria said before the Marlins’ season-opening 7-2 loss to Johan Santana and the New York Mets. “I’m asking people to realize we’re doing it the right way.

“We know how to build a championship team here. We’ve already done it once. When the stadium opens, we’ll be able to do the things we want to do.”

It’s clear they are following their plan of building with young talent but the main concern from fans is whether they will recycle these guys before they win again. To that, Loria responded:

“There are a lot of guys we’re going to keep,” he says, although he doesn’t say which ones.

“It’s OK to fall in love with these players,” he says, adding that this is “the most intriguing team” he’s ever been around.

We can interpret that to mean many things but in general you have to be optimistic when he encourages us “to fall in love” again.

As for the ballpark we learn that Loria, an internationally renown art dealer, is very hands on:

Loria finds himself drawing upon those early lessons more than ever as he increasingly turns his attention to planning every last intricacy of the Marlins’ future home. He spends hours each week on the phone to Kansas City, where a team of architects at the legendary HOK firm is working steadily to prepare the first set of renderings.

They aren’t expected for perhaps another year, but already certain hints are emerging.

The new park will give pitchers every chance to succeed when it opens in 2011, per the Marlins’ philosophy. But considering the day job of the club owner — international art dealer — it has the potential to be so much more than just another brick-lined playpen for millionaires.

Loria doesn’t sound interested in building yet another throwback yard.

“We’re not looking at retro,” he said. “We’d like to see a contemporary building … realizing that we’re in Florida.”

I already know that some people will complain about this. The fact is, the ballpark is located in the middle of a neighborhood without any strong architectural characteristics. Retro ballparks are great, but they’re also becoming more and more repetitive and stale. The jewels of the retro movements — Camden Yards and AT&T Park, were built sometime ago and both leverage their surroundings (the warehouse, McCovy Cove) to bring in a special feeling. Closed roof retro stadiums look like fake big airplane hangers.

The trend to modern styling, apparent in many of the new projects in Miami, is a trend around the world. Just look at Allianz Arena in Munich or the Beijing National Stadium for the latest inspiration in modern stadium design. In the end, we are better off with something that looks like the picture above then another Turner Field.

I realized that I forgot to provide this link to the full ballpark agreement which includes every last detail including the square footage of the the umpires bathrooms.

Former Philadelphia Eagles owner Norman Braman has filed suit to challenge the $3 billion public works project that includes the Marlins’ ballpark.

Braman is suing to stop Miami’s so-called ‘global agreement’ in its tracks, contending it was illegally hatched in secret and improperly uses money intended to cure urban blight and help poor people. Braman wants voters to decide projects of such magnitude, rather than politicians.

‘Taxpayers in this town have been ripped off constantly over the years,’ Braman said in a recent interview in his downtown Miami office.

‘It’s time that as citizens of this community that we say enough is enough — that we’re not going to put up with this any more,’ he added.

Braman has a history of fighting various tax-based initiatives including blocking the renovation of the Orange Bowl in the 1980s. He also has a history of running the Philadelphia Eagles into the ground and of course didn’t mind a public handout when he was looking to build a new stadium in Philly. And lets not forget that Braman owns car dealerships and any funds that go to support mass transit or development of urban areas may impact his ability to sell cars. Changing South Florida from a car-based sprawl to a more urban-centric layout (as you see in other major metropolitan areas) is not in his interest.

Anyway, Braman is rich and well connected (check out his bipartisan political giving history). Clearly he has influence, time, and money to try and ruin it for the rest of us.

Sorry for the light posts but I just got married and I’m sure my wife would kill me if she knew I was blogging about baseball on my honeymoon (actually, I just sent her for some spa treatment so I think I’m in the clear).

Anyway, Spring Training is here and the ballpark just received the City’s approval. County is up next. One more vote, that’s it.

Update: It’s done! County approved the deal by a 9-3 vote. A few open issues, but we can now say that the Miami Marlins will have a ballpark in 2011.

Speaks for itself:

The Marlins, Miami-Dade County, the city of Miami and Major League Baseball reached agreement late Friday to finance a $515 million ballpark at the site of the Orange Bowl, according to a source.

The agreement was not released, but was expected to be distributed to county and city commissioners, who will need to approve it. The city has scheduled a special commission meeting to consider the deal at 9 a.m. Thursday; the county commission is to meet at 1 p.m. that day.

The deal calls for the county and city to contribute $360 million mainly in tourist taxes and a $50 million general obligation bond Miami-Dade voters approved in 2004 to renovate the Orange Bowl, but which will instead be moved to the ballpark project.The Marlins are to contribute $155 million.

We kid, of course.

Miami-Dade County is losing its cool over the constant delays in the ballpark negotiations. Honestly, this is becoming a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for both sides so they need to start compromising. The longer the wait, the easier it is for this thing to collapse.

Anyway, the County is giving the negotiations three more weeks. Then what? Who knows.