• Commissioner Says Ballpark Doesn’t Have Votes

  • 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. More

  • Marlins Park
    • Fish@Bat
    • RETWEETED
      18 years ago

    • CJ — Thanks for the insight.

      Yes, I also appreciate that the deal is not completely done but all parties involved have been behaving like it is. Unfortunately, this reliance allows various people (both opponents and opportunists) to leverage the lack of closure to get something in return or to prove a point.

      Let’s hope this will be closed soon.

    • Charles Johnson
    • RETWEETED
      18 years ago

    • This is not rhetoric. There is absolute truth in what Martinez said. If the Marlins don’t stop screwing around, and give a little, they will have no stadium. By the way, their problems also extend to the City of Miami because of the public safety component. The City Commissioners want the City Fire and Police Department to hold operational control of the site. That is not what was agreed to by the respective managers. That is going to come to a head soon as well. Contrary to popular belief, the Marlins Stadium is not a done deal!!!

  • Downtime Before Gametime

  • We’re going to experience a few hiccups due to a necessary update coming up in the next few hours. Don’t lose faith, we’ll be back to normal in no time.

    Update: We’re back. Please contact us if anything looks broken.

  • Fish@Bat

  • City and County Resolve Ballpark First Responder Issue

  • 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 Park