Metro Council Approves New Sounds Lease

The Metro Council approved a new lease for the Nashville Sounds baseball team with no opposition in a meeting that took about three minutes today.

MFP Baseball, a New York-based real estate investment firm, won a seal of approval from the Metro Council, when not one person voiced a concern about its new, 5-year lease of Greer Stadium.

Prospective owner Frank Ward says his first order of business is to update the ballpark.

“Areas we’re focused on is: upgrading the bathrooms. Upgrading concession stands. Attempting to get a scoreboard that works.”

The new owners also have to make the stadium compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Mayor Karl Dean’s administration was not going to renew the current owner’s lease for failing to make upgrades. The new owners acknowledge they’ll probably not make full compliance, but will be doing the best they can.

Both the new owners and the mayor are already looking forward to building a new stadium, but Dean says the team has to meet some conditions first.

“We got a ways to go in the sense that they still have to get approval from major league, from the Pacific leagues, become the actual new owners of the team, do the work on the stadium they say they’re going to do, which I’m confident they will do.”

Dean says the new owners also have to win the confidence of the fans.

You can send your suggestions for improvements to Greer Stadium to the new owners on their blog.