After more than two years of work and much anticipation, city and county officials gathered Monday at the Kentucky Legend Fields — formerly known as the Owensboro Softball Complex — at Jack C. Fisher Park to celebrate the facility’s $2.9 million rebranding and renovation project.
Until the current Parks & Recreation administration saw the need and received approval for improvements, the sports complex at Fisher Park underwent minimal renovations since its construction in 1986.
With synthetic fields, expanded parking lots and a myriad of other cosmetic improvements, Parks Director Amanda Rogers said she anticipated increased usage and longer seasons of play for years to come.
“This facility usually operates from March to October,” Rogers said. “Now, with the synthetic turf, we can play as early as February and as late as November. It’s very important for our sports tourism machine here in the City of Owensboro — and when I say that, I’m talking about getting people from other communities to come here and spend their money here, because that infuses new dollars into our community.”
Under the state’s economic tourism formula — which is based on the number of days traveling teams and players stay in an area for a tournament — the former complex brought in $16 million to $17 million annually.
With the renovation project complete, Rogers said the complex would “easily” hold an additional eight events per season — driving the economic impact up to $22.5 million per year, she said.
“We won’t get any of that hotel tourism tax — that all goes to the county government,” Rogers said. “As a city, the benefit we see is how it benefits those local business owners, those local people working in the service industry. We do generate an occupational tax by making sure those businesses stay open and they’re generating business on the weekends.”
Before throwing the first pitch at Monday’s event, Mayor Tom Watson detailed the history of sports tourism in Owensboro and why the upgraded sports facility had been so needed.
“As we here in Owensboro saw success with our location, other communities caught on to the value of recreational tourism to our economy,” he said. “Competition has grown throughout our state and region as more facilities have been built. To stay competitive in the market, we as elected officials endeavored on this renovation project to, again, make this location the first in our area for synthetic.”
In total, improvements at Kentucky Legend Fields include creating four hybrid synthetic fields, replacing the irrigation system, improving infield drainage, adding batting cages, making practice field improvements, increasing parking availability in the front and back lots, adding more seating and shade areas, and the first playground in 20 years.
Already, Kentucky Legend Fields has begun drawing new teams and competitions to the complex, with the first collegiate softball tournament in 20 years held there in February.
“To know that we can provide synthetic fields to these young athletes, and to understand the value of what team sports do for a young person — knowing that we can provide that for people at this location — makes me happy,” Rogers said. “I’m nothing but excited to see the teams come out to play.”
