11:04am | The Long Beach Sports Council was created to promote economic development through sports in the city of Long Beach. Their first goal is to bring the Long Beach Armada, a minor league baseball team, back to the city for the 2012 season. The Armada played for five seasons at Blair Field as part of the North Division of the Golden Baseball League. They were unable to renew their permit to continue playing there when the City of Long Beach leased Blair Field to Cal State Long Beach after the 2009 season.

Now that Cal State Long Beach is planning to spend millions renovating Blair Field, the Long Beach Sports Council thinks now is the perfect time to bring back the Long Beach Armada. Cal State Long Beach’s Baseball season ends in May, leaving an open stadium for the Armada.

The Long Beach Sports Council also thinks that bringing back the Long Beach Armada would help the city of Long Beach generate additional city income by creating more business interests within the city. The positive benefits of the Armada being a recreational activity for families and people of all ages are also being extolled by the Long Beach Sports Council.

Their campaign for making the city friendlier to sports franchises calls for the City Council to create more business friendly policies, such as allowed alcohol to be served at Blair Field for Armada games.

The Long Beach Sports Council also hopes to recruit an NBA D-League team to Long Beach.

For more information, please contact Joe Smith, the press secretary of the Long Beach Sports Council at (562) 370-5577. You can also email him at [email protected].

Joe Smith and Jason Aula founded the Long Beach Sports Council this summer after an appearance by Aula on Smith’s radio show at Long Beach City College. It was there that they discussed bringing the Armada back to Long Beach.  The group has already begun outreach, and has set up a meeting with Councilmember Gary DeLong for next Tuesday.