Ramapo, NY – voters today rejected a $16.5 million financing plan that would have funded the construction of an independent minor league baseball stadium off Route 45 near Pomona.
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With about 90 percent of the polling stations reporting, 5,347 residents voted against the plan and 2,623 voted for it, according to unofficial results.
Though residents rejected the plan, Supervisor Christopher St. Lawrence said the town will move forward with the construction of the stadium.
The town may either accept a higher interest rate on the 20-year bonds, which have been guaranteed by the Ramapo Local Development Corp., or vote to finance the stadium with town funds.
The results of the vote were announced by St. Lawrence late tonight at the Holiday Inn Hotel and Conference Center in Suffern. He rejected the notion that residents voted against the stadium itself .
“I know these are tough times and I think that the vote tonight that was cast reflects those times,” he said. “What this means for ‘Project Grand Slam’ is that the voters in the town of Ramapo that went out on this day … have made it very clear that they do not want the town of Ramapo to guarantee the funding for the $16.5 million fo the stadium.
Councilman Yitzchok Ullman has said the results of the referendum would weigh heavily on his support for the stadium.
“The public has spoken and the Town Board has to take that into consideration,” he said.
Known by supporters as “Project Grand Slam,” the 3,500-seat stadium would host a Canadian American Association of Professional Baseball team owned by Bottom 9 Baseball, LLC that would begin next season in their new home on May 31, 2011. At least 50 games of the 100-game season would be played in the ballpark.
Supporters have also said the municipally owned stadium would be open to use by area college and high school sports teams, and would be able to host other events as well.
Opponents to the stadium question whether the stadium would be profitable and argue that the CanAm league has a history of numerous failed franchises. Detractors have also cited environmental concerns as grounds for halting the stadium, which is being built over 21 acres of once wooded land near the Samuel G. Fisher Mount Ivy Environmental Park and the Rockland Fire Training Center.
It looks that we really don’t have power at the votes.
Who needs it
I am confused, it looks like the ballpark is beeing build anyways and its beeing funded by the town, so what was the voting all about?
If he was so sure that the voters still want the stadium why doesn’t he pot it up to the voters. We are living in a country where voters interest are being ignored.
no more exit 12 on pallisades to get to my house anymore. oh well, exit 13 is almost as quick.
I don’t understand where all the askonim were before the election. In every other election, the Southeast Ramapo taxpayers association (or some similar name) asks people to vote down budgets and vote for certain candidates. The Monsey askonim were silent on this one. Almost as if they are giving St. Lawrence a pass to do what he wants. Well, I voted no and don’t want my tax dollars going for this stadium. If St. Lawrence thinks he can go ahead with it, it is because the local power brokers are letting him. Why are they doing that?
The vote was all about baltic. not money or tax
Latest Ramapo epic saga…. “The Emperor has no Clothes”. Our esteemed Supervisor did not seem to get the numbers from his constiuents that he needed. Why such a low turnout on a project that, as he has said, “Everyone wants and will bring all of Ramapo together”?. Kind of like his failed “Unity Meetings”, all two of them. He is a train wreck and we are watching his demise in slow motion. Hopefully, there will be something left of this community after he crashes. SAD.
What’s the difference between communism and a democrocy? in Communism the government do whatever they want and the citizens don’t have a right to give their opinion, and in a democrocy the citizens do have a right to give their opinion and the government still do whatever they want.
In Communism the government also takes YOUR property and doesn’t pay you for it. That is not happening in Rockland County. It also jails you or kills you if you complain. That isn’t happening in Rockland County. And in Communism you can’t vote out the people in charge. You can do that in Rockland County.
Comparing an inadvisable government project to Communism desecrates the memory of Communism’s victims.
I’m sure that all the block voters in Vizhnitz and New Square who got St. Lawrence elected will enjoy watching ball games in the new stadium.