ssanoski@vicksburgpost.com

Hundreds of kids and their families will have Halls Ferry Park on Bazinsky Road roaring with cheers over the next two weekends as the Governor’s Cup youth baseball tournament returns to Vicksburg.

About three miles away, the $4 million sports complex under construction off Fisher Ferry Road will be filled with only the steady buzz and hum of insects and songbirds.

Ground-clearing continues on the flood-prone site of the sports complex, but after two years of planning, re-planning, designing and redesigning, the benefits of the highly touted project remain unseen. Nonetheless, city officials, tourism promoters and local business owners are still hopeful the investment will pay big dividends in the future — and possibly could host the Governor’s Cup and many other tournaments beginning next year.

“If we had the facilities to accommodate more tournaments like (the Governor’s Cup), I think it could drive a lot of business to Vicksburg on the summer weekends that aren’t typically high-occupancy weekends,” said Lynn Foley, sales director for the Wingate by Wyndham hotel on South Frontage Road. “I’d love to see some similar activities in Vicksburg to increase demand in the mid-week and on the off weekends.” 

Foley said early bookings were at about 75 percent heading into this weekend and was confident the 82-room hotel within a short walk of Halls Ferry Park will sell out by the time the first team takes the field Friday. Paul Patel, regional operations director for Southern Hospitality Services — which owns and operates four hotels in Vicksburg, including the recently opened Courtyard by Marriott and Comfort Suites — said early bookings were leaner at their properties, about 35 to 40 percent.

“If they don’t sell out, they’ll get very close,” Patel said optimistically. “The summer baseball tournaments are very important to our business. We have hotels in other cities that do really well because of the teams that come in regularly. Our properties in Southaven — in summer you don’t even have to think about occupancy — they’re full every weekend with teams.”

Youth tournaments are big business, and for Vicksburg none compares to the Governor’s Cup. Drawing about 100 teams over two weekends, it’s one of the largest youth baseball tournaments in the state.

“It’s as big, if not bigger, than the Miss Mississippi pageant as far as the economic impact on the city,” said South Ward Alderman Sid Beauman, who served as the city’s parks and recreation director for eight years before being elected to the board in 2001. “It brings entire families to Vicksburg; this is not a drop-your-kid-off kind of event. It’s mommy and daddy, brother and sister and grandma and grandpa bringing new, clean money to Vicksburg — it’s what we need more of.” 

The idea for the sports complex started out big, got bigger and has ended up smaller than originally planned. The city set aside $4 million of a $16.9 million bond issue for the first phase of development in August 2007. The Aquilla Group LLC, a local initiative, formed in the summer of 2007 and announced a joint deal with the city to build a $25 million complex — later raised to $40 million — on the existing Halls Ferry Park site. Artist’s renderings of the park featuring soccer fields, tennis courts, condominiums and water fountains were developed, but only collected dust. 

A subsequent environmental study at Halls Ferry Park, a former city landfill, led to the search for a new location for the complex. The 200-acre parcel purchased by the city in 2003 for $325,000 just south of St. Michael Catholic Church eventually was chosen.

Clear River Construction was awarded a $2.38 million bid by the board of mayor and aldermen in December to begin clearing, grubbing and grading the site of the complex. However, Aquila has since pulled out of its commitment to the park, stating the tough economy.

Now, the plan is to have four adult softball fields built on the site as phase one, while a second phase will include additional youth fields. Beauman said he is hopeful the first four fields can be completed within a year.

“One thing we’ve missed the boat on is adult softball tournaments,” said Beauman. “We’re going to have portable fencing or something that will allow us to make the fields available for youth and women’s events on the first phase. Hopefully we’ll be playing on those fields next year.”

Beauman said the addition of more fields will happen much more quickly than the initial development of the park if the new administration approves them.

“You’ve got a lot of front-end expense on this because of the road going in there and the infrastructure that needs to be built, but any additional development will be able to be built much cheaper and much faster,” he said. “The previous board had planned to immediately begin on the youth fields once the first phase was completed.”

Despite the planning and re-planning of the park, Beauman said he hasn’t lost any interest in seeing the development come to fruition.

“I’m just as pumped about it now as I was when we first started planning it,” said Beauman. “I’m disappointed that we got to the point where we thought we were going to start and then had to start over, but I know how sports complexes like it can affect the city in so many positive ways — and I still believe that complex will be a real asset to the community.”