D.C. Metro Fund Weighed To Boost Navy Yard Stop

Proposal Responds to Rising Stadium Cost

District officials are considering using millions of dollars from a special city-controlled account under Metro's budget to help pay for a massive renovation of the Navy Yard Station necessary to accommodate large crowds for a new baseball stadium, a D.C. Council member said yesterday.

Jim Graham (D-Ward 1), who is on Metro's board of directors, said City Administrator Robert C. Bobb broached the idea of using special Metro funds for the station renovation in a private conversation recently. Graham's comments mark the first time the money has been mentioned publicly as a way to address the council's concerns about the rising costs of the stadium project along the Anacostia River in Southeast Washington.

"We're looking at it," Graham said. "There's been no decision yet. I'm not at peace with this issue yet."

Metro spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein said the District has $16.8 million in its joint-development fund, but she said $12.7 million of that has been allocated to other needs.

The projected increase in cost for the stadium project, from the $535 million the council approved last year to recent city estimates of $667 million, forced Mayor Anthony A. Williams (D) to ask the council last week to delay its vote on a stadium lease agreement with Major League Baseball.

The Williams administration will not resubmit the lease to the council until mid-January, Bobb said yesterday. Baseball officials have threatened to take the city to arbitration if the lease is not approved before Saturday, the deadline in the stadium agreement.

"I wouldn't be surprised if they pursued that strategy," Bobb said at the mayor's weekly news conference, during which he filled in for Williams, who was sick. "If we were on the other side, I'd advise the mayor to do that."

Reached on vacation, Baseball President Robert A. DuPuy said in an e-mail: "I said before I left that we would proceed with taking whatever actions are available to us at the earliest possible time. Nothing has happened to change that."

The plan to use the special Metro account is one of several options the city is considering to help pay for the stadium project. Officials also said this week that they are considering selling development rights on land adjacent to the stadium to developers or the Washington Nationals' new owner once baseball sells the franchise.

In 2000, Metro established a "joint-development program" with its three operating jurisdictions -- the District, Virginia and Maryland. Under the program, when Metro develops shops, restaurants and offices on land it owns around the region, the profits are split among the three jurisdictions.

Each jurisdiction controls its account and can request the money be used for transportation-related programs, Graham said.

As the closest station to the new stadium site, the Navy Yard needs an upgrade that Metro officials have estimated will cost $20 million.