Major League Baseball, which has shut the Nationals team store at RFK, continued to take measures to halt its operations in Washington.
Officials said that they had suspended indefinitely the sale of the Nationals, which baseball owners purchased from Jeffrey Loria in February 2002 for $120 million. Twenty-eight groups have inquired about buying the Nationals, with about eight placing a $100,000, partially refundable deposit, according to a league spokesman.
Council Chairman Linda W. Cropp leaves a news conference in which she asked baseball to "give us a few months."
(Preston Keres -- The Washington Post)
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Major League Baseball also has halted negotiations on a compensation package with Baltimore Orioles owner Peter G. Angelos, who is concerned about a loss of revenue if Washington gets a team.
Nationals President Tony Tavares, who is in California this week to be on hand for the birth of a grandson, said that by 5:30 p.m. yesterday, about 150 of the more than 16,000 people who put down deposits on season tickets had called to get a refund of their $300. Major League Baseball offered refunds Wednesday in a statement released by DuPuy.
City leaders said they are running out of time to come to an agreement. The council can reconsider the stadium financing legislation at its final meeting of the year Tuesday, but Cropp would have to agree because she sets the agenda. Cropp has said she would be open to doing so if Major League Baseball offered significant cost-saving concessions.
Council members Harold Brazil (D-At Large), Jack Evans (D-Ward 2) and Vincent B. Orange Sr. (D-Ward 5), who supported using public funds to build the stadium, lashed out at Cropp at a news conference.
"If it dies, it's because Mrs. Cropp killed baseball," Orange said of the baseball deal. He added that most business leaders are comfortable with the gross receipts tax that is to be used to help pay for the $530 million in bonds to cover construction. A late change in the legislation Tuesday night lowered the amount businesses would have to pay, from $26 million a year to $14 million. The additional $12 million would be funded through a utilities tax on businesses and government buildings.
Evans and Mark Tuohey, chairman of the D.C. Sports and Entertainment Commission, had separate meetings with Cropp yesterday. Evans said Cropp was standing firm in her position.
The legislation requires that Natwar M. Gandhi, the city's chief financial officer, seek bids for private financing options and forward to the council any plan that he can certify as workable. If no plan is found by June, the stadium deal would die.
Baseball owners are fearful that the uncertain nature of the council's requirement for private funding could lower the potential sale price of the team. But Cropp has been concerned about the potential rising costs of the stadium project, which has been pegged to cost up to $584 million by some city officials when infrastructure and land acquisition costs are factored in.
Mayoral aides said the ballpark structure will cost about $279 million, so the council's legislation requires that $140 million be funded with private money.
Cropp said entrepreneurs have offered several new private financing plans since the council's action Tuesday. So far, Cropp and administration officials have said that one of the most viable plans would raise as much as $100 million by charging motorists to park along the curbs in neighborhoods surrounding the stadium.
Staff writers Spencer S. Hsu and Barry Svrluga contributed to this report.
