Minor League Baseball is quitting as management for the Durham Athletic Park, effective Aug. 1, 2012.

MiLB Management President Pat O'Conner gave notice Thursday in a letter to Kevin Dick, Durham's economic and workforce development director.

Dick said the termination came as "a slight surprise."

The first pitch of the Long Ball Program youth league will be thrown at 6 p.m. Monday at Durham Athletic Park.

The league, part of a Minor League Baseball pilot program, fields teams for ages 13-18 and welcomes sponsors and donors.

The league is free for the players but is a lot of hard work for the coaches, who scramble to find donations for everything from uniforms and snacks to dirt for the infield.

If the Durham Athletic Park seems brighter when you're going by at night, it ought to. The old ballpark has a new set of lights, courtesy of the Musco Lighting Co. and Minor League Baseball.

According to City Hall, MiLB persuaded Musco to donate $150,000 worth of 1,500-watt metal halide lights to replace 80 lights that had been in use for 30 years and were no longer up to standards for college and pro baseball.

The city spent $49,000 for design and installation, taken from the approved general-services budget.

N.C. Central University's baseball team plays its home games at the DAP, along with Durham School of the Arts and assorted other local teams. MiLB operates the park as a training facility for ballpark personnel.

"We’re really pleased with the outcome and hope it leads to even more folks using the ballpark,” general services Director Joel Reitzer said in a prepared statement. Most of the old lights were moved to city park ballfields.

“What spare parts we weren’t able to reuse have been recycled," according to Reitzer.

Even if you don’t play baseball, know anybody who plays baseball or
even like baseball, there’s still a good reason to turn out at the
Durham Athletic Park on Wednesday night:

To support the 120 teenage boys who will be playing ball this summer
because parents, businesses and organizations banded together to make
sure there’s a season.

Postponed two days because of Monday’s rain, the season-opening game
of The Long Ball Program will is scheduled to start at 6 p.m. today.

The Durham Athletic Park reopened on Saturday, August 15, 2009, after renovation as part of Durham's $5.5 million restoration project.

How big a loss to the Bull City is Assistant City Manager Alan DeLisle's departure? An e-mail from interim finance director Keith Herrmann gives a good overview.

DeLisle oversaw some ofthe city's signature projects. Jim Wise reports in this morning's News & Observer (reported on this blog yesterday afternoon) that Minor League Baseball has concerns with the pace and quality of renovations to the Historic Durham Athletic Park. "Someone  has to replace Al as the point person to nurture this relationship and ensure MiLB stays committed to Durham for the long term," Herrman writes.

The Greenfire developers, who envision remaking the center city as a place where people can live, work and play, is an even bigger concern. Greenfire has bought more than 25 properties in and near downtown. Its 17-year, 13-property project of building and renovation inside the Downtown Loop alone represents an investment of $295 million. But the public-private partnership deal is complex, Herrman tells City Manager Tom Bonfield. "Who takes ownership of the various agreements?"

And then of course there is the Durham Performing Arts Center. Cool building, no doubt about that, but naming rights are lagging. The city can force the developer to pay 60 percent of whatever comes up short, but it's on the hook for the remaining 40 percent, plus interest on anything that later comes in against the developers' share. "Who takes over the City leadership of the DPAC oversight committee upon Al's departure?" asks Herrman. "We need to designate a 'theater persn.'"

DeLisle is leaving Durham to take over the Downtown Development Corp. of Louisville, Ky. He starts his new job Feb. 2.

Minor League Baseball is not pleased with progress on the Durham Athletic Park's renovation, and City Manager Tom Bonfield has called for an update report by next Tuesday.

In a Dec. 19 letter to Alan DeLisle, assistant city manager for economic development, Minor League Baseball CEO Pat O'Conner [cq] wrote that, "the DAP renovation project is falling short of everyone's goals and expectations."

Renaissance Downtown Durham, a nonprofit branch of Downtown Durham Inc., is selling name recognition to raise money for the Durham Athletic Park's new seats.

For $100 per seat, or $2,000 and $5,000 per box, you get a tax deduction, one free pass per seat to the World Beer Festival, your name on the seat or box you pay for and your name on a plaque at the gate. Details here.