No resolution for Fairgrounds Field
The case for saving Fair Grounds Field is compelling and goes beyond simply preserving a baseball park. A restored Fair Grounds Field can once again be a place to celebrate Shreveport’s youthful expressions of the nation’s pastime, a central location for other outdoor events, and a powerful example of our city maximizing its core neighborhoods.
Friends of Fair Grounds Field was formed as a nonprofit organization in 2022 to make the case to city of Shreveport officials intent on demolishing the stadium. When our efforts at persuasion failed, we went to court to stop the bulldozers. In the meantime, a new administration moved into Government Plaza, and we have initiated talks with Mayor Tom Arceneaux with hopes of a better outcome.
Fair Grounds Field was built during the Mayor John Hussey administration with proceeds from the city’s 1986 bond issue. As recently as 2019, in a separate bond issue, Shreveport voters expressed their desire to preserve the facility.
We began working with city officials and other parties in July 2022 when we learned of the previous administration’s plan to demolish the stadium. Numerous public officials representing Queensborough, Ingleside, Werner Park, Sunset Acres and other neighborhoods surrounding the State Fairgrounds were not informed of the demolition and expressed their concerns to us.
In building our case for preservation, we conducted research into the stadium’s use and maintenance. Because winged bats moved in after baseball bats moved out, we studied bat guano and histoplasmosis, an infection caused by breathing in spores of a fungus often found in bird and bat droppings.
We also reviewed more significant issues about improving the State Fair campus and these facilities’ role in the vitality of surrounding inner-city Shreveport. We believe the future of Shreveport’s inner-city youth is critical to this discussion.
In these matters, we are indebted to public officials, business and faith leaders, and neighborhood organizations that have called this part of the city their home for many years.
Friends of Fair Grounds Field went to court in September 2022 as a last resort. Before the litigation, we met with former Mayor Adrian Perkins and City Economic
Development Director Andrew Mouton and spoke by telephone with Shreveport Parks Director Shelley Ragle. We were told the main obstacles to saving the stadium were as follows:
1. City officials said they did not know how to program or utilize the field.
We promptly responded with concrete plans by Caddo School Superintendent Lamar Goree, Evangel Christian Academy Chancellor Denny Duron, YMCA of Northwest Louisiana CEO Gary Lash, and State Fair of Louisiana board member and former Caddo 4-H agent Jon Lowe. All have significant plans for how the multipurpose stadium could be used.
2. City officials said the building was structurally unsound and costly to renovate.
Multiple contractors have assured the city and Friends that the 37-year-old building is structurally sound. Christopher Coe, architect for state renovation of the J.D. Waggoner Building and the Chamber of Commerce headquarters, told Mayor Perkins that the stadium was structurally sound and less expensive to renovate than building new. Surprisingly, we learned that the city had no independent engineering or related studies on the structural integrity of the stadium.
3. City officials said there were drainage issues that were either difficult or impossible to cure.
Water-penetration issues resulted from a clogged city drainage line and undersized drainage pipes on the infield. Cleaning the drainage lines can be completed at no cost, and increasing the size of the infield lines can be done at a modest cost.
4. The city was concerned with the bat infestation.
Friends contacted Bat Conservation International, a nonprofit advocacy group with offices in Austin, Texas, and Washington, D.C., and United Bat Control, a nationwide for-profit company that relocates bats.
These organizations had previously provid ed expert information to the city about Fair Grounds Field on how to address the stadium’s colony of bats, a protected species.
In summary, we furnished the city with solid information for programming a refurbished Fair Grounds Field, on the facility’s structural soundness and cost of renovation, and on how to cure the drainage problems and bat infestation.
Despite all this, in early September 2022 the city began to demolish the stadium.
Unfortunately, before our restraining order halted the demolition on Oct. 3, 2022, damage by the city’s contractor had been done, not only to the stadium, but in spreading airborne bat feces to the surrounding area.
Shreveport is now at a crossroads with regard to Fair Grounds Field. Having answered many of the questions surrounding the facility and its future, we believe our community’s discussion about the stadium’s future should broaden to consider the interests of the State Fair, the neighborhoods near the fairgrounds and our inner-city youth.
Sports and concern for our youth are two common denominators in our diverse city. Our excellence in sports and production of many world-class athletes are a justifiable source of pride. A refurbished and reprogrammed Fair Grounds Field can unify Shreveport around a multi-purpose stadium and important quality-of-life venue.
Friends of Fair Grounds Field desires to help the city and State Fair to renovate and reprogram Fair Grounds Field, the Fairgrounds campus and surrounding neighborhoods, for the betterment of all.
