A longtime LGBT softball league in Birmingham is threatening to take its national tournament to Tuscaloosa if the city allows Major League Baseball to build a youth academy at George Ward Park, arguing that the proposed development would create a logistical nightmare.

The Birmingham Park and Recreation Board is in discussions with MLB on the youth academy, which would be open year-round and offer free baseball instruction to the city’s youth. MLB has opened similar academies in inner cities to foster a love of baseball among minority communities., and is pledging at least $5 million in upgrades to the park.

“There are a lot of minorities that can benefit from this,” said Montal Morton, the board’s president.

“Kids can come over, play softball, play baseball and look around and see nice homes, see lawns manicured. It’s not about softball, it’s about building a community. They’ll be able to see a quality of life, they’ll be able to get away from the gunshots they see nightly.”

The New South Softball League, which has been in Birmingham since 1982 and hosts the Southern Shootout, a 50-team tournament at George Ward over Easter weekend, needs all six softball fields in place at the park in order to hold the weekend tournament, according to Rod Spann, the league’s commissioner. He told a planning meeting Friday of the park board that any renovations to George Ward’s softball fields would also make the facility less attractive to tournament participants.

“If we’re telling them were playing on baseball fields, we’re going to lose half the teams,” Spann said.

The league has the backing of City Council President Valerie Abbott and Stephen Foster, president of the Five Points South Neighborhood Association.

Foster said the Southern Shootout creates $500,000 in tax revenue for the city when players from outside Alabama book hotels and patronize bars and restaurants in the area.

“There’s a huge economic impact,” Foster said. “The MLB training academy, albeit it will draw people, it won’t draw the numbers from outside resources to help compensate for that type of travel and revenue expense coming in.”

Abbott said she is in favor of bringing an MLB academy to Birmingham but said George Ward Park is not an ideal location.

“We have a full softball program there now and full utilization of that park. Why take away a park that has a program that is working wonderfully well … and undo that in favor of doing something else when we have so many other parts of town and so many other parks that are in need of renovations and infusion of capital?” she said. “We don’t want to lose this to Tuscaloosa.”

Park board member Larry Cockrell noted that the board is offering the softball leagues use of other fields at Cooper Green, Ensley and Memorial parks for the tournament, but the league said the logistics wouldn’t work.

City Councilor and park board member William Parker suggested that the league moving to Tuscaloosa is an empty threat.

“They’re not going to move. And I always don’t like the fact people want to threaten. Everybody’s trying to work together,” he said. “Don’t use this threat of going to Tuscaloosa, because I don’t like the threats. There’s a way we all can work together for the city of Birmingham, and that’s our main goal.”

Parker said the league should work out a compromise with the park board.

“The other thing you have to look at is how does this benefit the citizens of Birmingham and the youth? There’s got to be a balance here,” the councilor said. “So therefore we have to balance not only to make sure that you have people coming to your restaurants just like we got to consider about Titusville and the other neighborhoods, so there’s a balance there.”

No action was taken at the meeting, but Cockrell said the board’s park committee could issue a recommendation to support the academy at a later date.