Yakima council eyes facilities district vote in attempt to keep Bears in town

YAKIMA, Wash. -- In a pair of surprise moves Tuesday, the Yakima City Council voted to take a stab at keeping the Yakima Bears baseball team and to revisit the controversial employment-screening program known as E-Verify.

Engineered by Councilman Dave Edler, a former Seattle Mariner, the council voted 5-1 to approach Selah and Union Gap about teaming up to build a new stadium in an attempt to keep the Bears from relocating to Vancouver, Wash.

Funding would come via a special district and only if voters in all three communities agree to raise the sales tax. First, however, city officials in Selah and Union Gap have to put it on the ballot.

"Let’s dream big," Edler urged the council, suggesting city officials also consider dusting off shelved plans for a regional aquatics center.

The vote came after a round of soul-searching and finger-pointing instigated by Edler, who accused his colleagues of lacking the will to keep the Bears. Last week the team announced plans to move to Vancouver — contingent upon construction there of a new 3,500-seat, $23 million stadium.

Edler insisted the announcement does not represent a "done deal" but could doom Yakima’s chances of enticing another team "for a generation." In recent years, several professional or semi-professional teams have struggled to survive in Yakima, most notably the Sun Kings basketball team.

"We can silently stand by as our team sneaks out of town, or we can declare this is a quality-of-life issue and we’re going to give our citizens final say," Edler said.

Joining Edler in exploring a public facilities district were Dave Ettl, Maureen Adkison, Micah Cawley and Bill Lover. (Councilwoman Kathy Coffey was absent.) Ettl pushed for a vote, despite his sense the community was indifferent about the fate of the Bears.

"Anybody else getting pushed to save the Bears?" he asked.

Voting no was Councilman Rick Ensey, who admitted he’s "ambivalent" about sports but does feel strongly that it’s wrong for government to help private enterprise.

The Bears, a minor-league affiliate of the Arizona Diamondbacks, had been pursuing a financing package with Yakima and, later, Union Gap for more than a year to replace county-owned Yakima County Stadium at State Fair Park. City officials have said team ownership was reluctant to seek a public vote to raise taxes.

The modest 2,654-seat county stadium is the smallest in the Class A Northwest League and doesn’t meet current minor league baseball standards.

In addition, attendance at the team’s 38 home games over the past five years averaged fewer than 1,800 fans, about half of the average for other Class A franchises.

Said Ensey, "I’m surprised the Bears have stuck around this long."

In the other surprise move, the City Council also voted 4-2 to debate anew the merits of the federal employment-screening database known as E-Verify.

A year ago, the council rejected E-Verify after a sometimes-heated debate that touched on the divisive issue of illegal immigration.

The vote then was 4-3, but Ensey appears to have changed his position from last year, thus suggesting the council could just as narrowly approve E-Verify this time around.

The move was brought up by Ettl, who said more and more communities are adopting the free online program offered by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which checks identities against several federal databases.

"It’s not going to be a hardship on anybody," Ettl said, suggesting thresholds of $2,500 for service contracts and $5,000 for public works contracts.

Voting yes were Ettl, Ensey, Cawley and Lover. Voting no were Adkison and Edler.

As part of the debate, Lover announced plans to ask the council to rescind a 2003 resolution recognizing Mexican consular identification cards as valid ID.

• Chris Bristol can be reached at 509-577-7748 or cbristol@yakimaherald.com.