NEW ULM — The 2020 Amateur Baseball State Tournaments will come to New Ulm in late August following a 3-2 decision from the New Ulm City Council.

The council was formally asked for permission to use Johnson and Mueller Park for the three weekends of the tournament during the Tuesday meeting.

New Ulm was awarded the 2020 state tournament years ago, and the renovation of these fields was planned in preparation for the tournament, but with the COVID-19 pandemic, holding the tournament comes with a potential health risk.

Through the tournament, 64 baseball teams are expected to play in New Ulm over three weekends. In addition, the tournament will bring outside fans to the city.

On June 20, at the Minnesota Baseball Association (MBA) board meeting, the New Ulm Baseball Association (NUBA) voiced their concerns about the potential community health risks, but the MBA stated they are moving forward with the season and the tournament. MBA based their decision on governance from the state. Regulations will allow the tournament to move forward under state guidelines.

Key requirements include limiting occupancy to 25%, not exceeding 250 persons, and ensuring social distancing of a minimum of 6 feet between persons.

NUBA President Bob Skillings said games have been hosted at both parks with the COVID-19 guidelines in place, and NUBA was following all requirements.

“We’re taking the names and numbers of everyone that comes into the park. We’re counting those that come into the park. We set up social distancing around our concessions,” Skillings said.

During the first game at the new Johnson Park, attendance was kept to 250 people. Skillings said 75 to 100 fans were turned away from the game due to reaching COVID capacity. Skillings believes NUBA will be able to maintain the guidelines during the tournament through the experience based on the games already scheduled in July.

“We recognize how important health is to our community,” he said. “We’re doing the best we can to mitigate that through our ballparks.”

The tournament is for 64 teams, but Skillings said the teams will not all be in town at the same time. In addition, 12 of the games will be held in Springfield.

Councilor Les Schultz raised concerns about the fans who were unable to get into the field during games. He heard that fans unable to get into the first game at Johnson Park gathered at the fences, ignoring social distancing concerns.

Council Lisa Fischer attended the game but said those watching from the fence were following social distancing. There were family groups, but they remained separate.

NUBA confirmed an additional screen would be placed at the field to prevent people from viewing the game outside of the ballparks.

Skillings said during a normal tournament, players would remain at the ballparks and in the community after the games to socialize, but with COVID-19 this activity won’t happen.

MBA President Fred Roufs and MBA Secretary/Treasurer Dr. Mike Nagel spoke during the meeting to address concerns.

Roufs said he attended the first game at Johnson Park last week and was pleased to see the crowd and how the game was handled. Roufs believes it could be controlled for the tournament. Roufs went into the regulations set up by the MBA. A person testing positive for COVID-19 must be quarantined for 14 days. Everyone on the team must be tested. If this happens close to the tournament some teams might not be eligible to play.

Nagel said MBA also quarantines any team that played against a team with an infected player seven days earlier. No team-to-team transmission has happened as far as MBA is aware.

“We want our players safe. We want your people safe,” Nagel said. He later added the city had no legal responsibility to the fans attending. Signs would be posted warning attendees they enter the ballpark at their own risk.

“We don’t want the fans to get sick, but they choose to come on their own volition. It is their job to social distance,” Nagel said. He added that to help enforce social distancing games have been stopped until fans abided by social distancing rules.

Councilor David Christian leaned against having the tournament because of phone calls he received from the public. Some of those against the tournament were baseball enthusiasts.

“I realize the baseball association has countless hours, man-hours, and money, invested in it,” he said.

Under the current guidelines, the tournament is going to see a decrease in numbers.

Christian asked if NUBA was already behind financially.

Skillings was unsure how much of a financial impact NUBA was facing. He believes they could generate significant revenue through concessions, but advertising was already compromised.

“We were hoping we could pay for our new [observation] deck,” he said. The city agreed to pay for an additional observation deck as part of the RENU improvements at Johnson Park with the understanding NUBA would pay back the extra cost. NUBA thought the extra revenue from this tournament could cover the cost, but that is unlikely now.

Councilor Larry Mack said the council had the right to protect the community, and residents are concerned about bringing people into town who might not be healthy.

Schultz said Brown County was lucky in terms of COVID-19 cases compared to other counties but wanted to keep infections low.

City Attorney Tom Borgen asked if tickets could be all pre-sale to help prevent large crowds over the limit attending games.

Roufs said this could be done if necessary for the tournament to continue.

Brown County Public Health Director Karen Moritz was concerned with bringing in extra people into the community. She acknowledged it would have been nice to show off the parks with this tournament, but said some other venues and festivals were canceled for health reasons. She could not recommend going forward with the tournament, but said if the city does, she suggested advance ticket sales and increased COVID signage at the ballpark.

She believes social distancing at concession stands would be the hardest part.

Moritz said cases of COVID were increasing across the nation, and it was related to reopening establishments and people coming together in large groups.

Public Health Supervisor Jamie Brand said locally, bars have already struggled to meet capacity guidelines and chose to close again. She said it is about more than the baseball players and fans, it is about the community.

“Activities have been pushed off a year for the safety of our community members,” Brand said. “We need to protect our community.”

Dr. Ann Vogel also addressed the council. She said baseball being in New Ulm this year is not a life or death situation, but exposing a vulnerable population to COVID could be life or death.

“We are a smaller facility. We have a good medical facility. We have limited resources,” Vogel said. “If we get overrun with cases that need to be in an ICU or spill over into surrounding regional or metropolitan facilities, we are going to be in big trouble.”

Nagel later commented that Vogel’s concerns were a scare tactic, and that the baseball games were not increasing COVID infections. He said the council owed it to the businesses that would benefit from this tournament.

Vogel responded that the information given on COVID infections is not scare-tactics. This information was needed to educate the public.

Schmitz said he did not know which way to vote on this issue. He heard arguments in both directions, but said at the bottom of his heart, he felt the tournament was the best thing for New Ulm.

“It has a possibility of really working,” Schmitz said. He said baseball games are being played now and with a few more weeks experiencing running games in the fields, the tournament could be managed.

Schmitz did not expect the tournament would create as big a revenue boost for restaurants because of the restrictions but believed something was better than nothing.

Schultz said Gov. Tim Walz had set up guidelines that could allow the tournament to continue, but said the governor could even add greater restrictions that force the tournament to shut down.

Schmitz said the city isn’t breaking any rules or regulations by hosting the tournament.

“Somewhere along the line, life has to go on,” he said. “This town is noted for baseball, and we might owe it to them to do it.”

Mack said the Brown County Fair and Bavarian Blast already canceled to protect the community. Mack said the council needed to protect the community and businesses from a spike in COVID cases.

Schultz said he was convinced MBA and NUBA could make the tournament work. He ultimately made the motion to approve the use of Johnson and Mueller parks on the condition Brown County Public work with an MBA on the COVID preparedness program and follow the guidelines while in the parks. Fischer seconded the motion.

Schmitz, Schultz and Fischer approved the motion, with Mack and Christian voting against.

The tournament is scheduled to be held over three weekends: August 21-23; August 28-30 and Sept. 4-7. The games will be held in New Ulm and Springfield, with most of the games played at Johnson and Mueller.