Same story, different city. Major League Baseball wants a new stadium and bullies the city into paying for it. Only this time, it’s a round of minor league baseball stadiums for everyone!

The city of Everett, Washington, is under siege. The minor league baseball team in town, the Everett AquaSox, has a stadium, Funko Field. But MLB, which has jurisdiction over minor league clubs, threatened to leave if they didn’t get certain stadium upgrades. A study was done, and the upgrades to Funko Field were doable. But that wasn’t enough for MLB, which is pushing for a new stadium downtown.

Property owners downtown and taxpayers statewide have pushed back. It seems similar to what happened in Eugene with the Emeralds, where groups like Taxpayers for Transparency, the Lane County Fair Board and the Oregon Logging Conference pushed back, and citizens voted down a $15 million bond, slowing MLB’s effort to restrain trade and lessen competition.

Now MLB is trying to exploit Medford taxpayers and build a new $90 million stadium with $45 million to $50 million in taxpayer funding for the Emeralds. Meanwhile, in Portland, MLB wants a $1.5 billion to $2 billion MLB stadium supported by $800 million in state-authorized bonds.

Over the last several years, major and minor league baseball officials have bullied Everett staff, council members and even the Washington Legislature into thinking there is no option but to build them a brand new stadium, on the backs of taxpayers and through the proposed low-balling displacement of many businesses.

The funding is being scraped together by a crucially in-debt city, and includes taking money for youth activity funds in order to further line the pockets of professional team owners.

Did MLB brainwash the Washington and Oregon state legislatures and the Portland and Medford city councils? Is there a breach of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act? People should say something!

Susan Goodenough
Mountlake Terrace, Washington