Did Boldt really act alone in killing baseball?

On Monday it was Commissioner Marc Boldt’s turn to be interviewed for CVTV’s “Clark County Focus.”

You can watch it here. I apologize in advance for talking so loud into the mic clipped on my shirt. Print journalists really should be read and not heard.

Anyway, I started by taking a trip down memory lane, all the way back to November, when Commissioner Steve Stuart had a dream to bring the Class A Yakima Bears to Vancouver and Boldt killed it.

Prior to the hearing on an admissions tax, Commissioner Tom Mielke knew he’d be voting no and Stuart knew he’d be voting yes.

When did Boldt, the swing vote, know he’d vote no?

He said he’d made up his mind before the meeting. For one, he couldn’t get over the idea of making moviegoers pay for baseball. Even if it was 50 cents on a $10 ticket. Turn that around, he said: Would people going to baseball games want to pay a tax to support movie theaters?

Second, he said the Friday before the hearing he was paid a visit by some of the members of the Vancouver City Council. (That makes them sound like a gang, I told him). The councilors told him there were not enough votes to support an interlocal funding agreement.

In other words, if Boldt wouldn’t kill the proposal, the Vancouver City Council would.

He figured if the Vancouver City Council didn’t support the stadium, who was he, a Hockinson resident, to tell them what they should have in Vancouver? So rather than a prolonged death, he killed the proposal with his “no” vote.

Baseball supporters viewed Boldt as the villian. Here’s a newspaper box outside of The Columbian the day after the hearing:

Other highlights from the interview:

• Since the BPA shot down the Grey Line alternative he thinks the lines should be as far east as possible.

• He’s been to the Value Motel and believes it has been sufficiently cleaned up. He told the owner, Milt Brown, that he will stay there one night to see firsthand what it’s like (and not tell Brown in advance.)

• The State of the County address will be Feb. 2 at Washougal High School. Boldt, as the new chairman, will deliver it. I asked if he writes his own speeches or lets employees in the county’s public information office handle that. He says he writes his own speeches, but they are edited.

Finally, I asked him about texting during meetings because a reader had seen him do it. He said he’s used his phone a few times during meetings but hasn’t in awhile and won’t do it again.

As for what he said about Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber’s latest proposal for the Columbia River Crossing, well, watch the show.