Cayetano wants
reality check on
‘field of dreams’

Gov. wonders, 'if we build it,
will they come?'

By Bruce Dunford
Associated Press

Gov. Ben Cayetano says he wants to do a reality check on the planned $27 million sports complex in Kapolei where professional baseball teams from Japan would hold spring training.

For years, it has been a sort of "Field of Dreams" for Senate President Norman Mizuguchi (D, Aiea) and his close friend, isle sports great Wally Yonamine, who is enshrined in Japan's baseball Hall of Fame.

"I'm not a big believer in 'Build it and they will come,' " Cayetano said yesterday.

"We're holding the project because we had asked Wally Yonamine to explore if there were any Japanese teams interested in using it for spring training and so far, we don't have any," he said. "So what we're doing is reevaluating it."

Cayetano denied but appeared amused at a question that his holding up the sports complex has anything to do with his differences with Mizuguchi over the Senate's rejection 2 months ago of his reappointments of Margery Bronster as attorney general and Earl Anzai as budget director.

Mizuguchi was not available for comment yesterday.

The Cayetano administration is looking at reconfiguring the 60-acre sports project, for which the Legislature appropriated the money in 1997.

"You know, the thought has always been to maybe have a Williamsburg of the Pacific for Little League baseball or international soccer, stuff like that, where they could come to hold meets and in between the local people could use it," Cayetano said.

Local soccer officials say there are many soccer organizations that would like to hold international tournaments in Hawaii, he said.

It could also include a stadium that would be an alternative to Aloha Stadium for high school football games, Cayetano said.

He added that Seiji Naya, director of the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism, suggested a marketing and feasibility study for a sports spring training facility. "That hasn't been done," Cayetano said.

Cayetano last year hired Yonamine -- who played, coached and managed in Japan for 38 years -- for $1 a year as a special adviser for sports promotion.

At the time, the governor said Hawaii could become a great location for a training facility, while also providing medical care and rehabilitation services.