Published: December 04, 2007 07:37 am      

Signals mixed for city baseball deal

Johnstown’s prospects for a new minor-league baseball team appear to be dwindling, with mixed signals coming from a North Carolina-based league that inquired about a franchise last month.

Just a few days ago, Atlantic Coast League Administrator Michael Harden declared on the league’s Web site that he “will no longer pursue” Johnstown as a site for a team.

However, after an inquiry Monday from The Tribune-Democrat, Harden said “nothing is completely set in stone.”

This much is clear: Harden has made his pronouncements without traveling to Johnstown or meeting with city officials. A meeting scheduled for Nov. 19 was canceled by Harden.

“We were willing to sit down with them and listen to what they had to say,” city Councilman Nunzio Johncola said.

The independent, minor-league organization has not yet played a game but projects an opening day in May 2009.

“I was scheduled to meet with the city, but I just feel that it would be a wasted trip, judging by the comments being made on how the council feels about the idea,” Harden wrote in a press release dated Nov. 30.

Local officials have approached Harden’s proposal with caution. They worry about reliving the financial problems and disputes that surrounded the 2002 exit of the Johnnies, the city’s last professional baseball team.

City administrators also express reservations about giving a baseball team too much authority over operations at Point Stadium, which just underwent an $11 million renovation.

“We can’t lose control of the stadium,” Johncola said. “The stadium is for everybody.”

That apparently is a sticking point for Harden, who on Monday said he “will not have a team in the league that a city wants complete control over.”