Mariners creating fund to support event staff who will lose pay during MLB shutdown
Seattle Mariners president and CEO Kevin Mather looks forward to his nightly walks around T-Mobile Park during the baseball season.
He strikes up conversations with the hourly workers — though, admittedly, he usually does this during the rush right before first pitch, when he says he should wait until the first inning is underway, and the workers aren’t so busy — that make visiting the ballpark an enjoyable experience for fans.
When he participates in speaking circuits, Mather is often asked what makes Seattle’s baseball destination so special — and he always gives the same answer.
“It’s not the views, it’s not the roof, it’s not The ‘Pen,” Mather said during a conference call Tuesday afternoon. “It’s our hourly employees — the seating host, the ticket takers, the cleaning crew, security, the retail employees, the concessions workers.
“T-Mobile Park is clean, safe, fan friendly and our day-of-game employees, they live it, they live that saying — ‘clean, safe, fan friendly.’ ”
So, when it became clear these hourly employees would miss out on paychecks when MLB shut down due to coronavirus concerns — Opening Day is now tentatively set for sometime in May — the Mariners felt compelled to help.
Mather said he notices two things during his trips around the ballpark — these employees are passionate fans, just like anyone else walking through the gate, and they feel like a part of the Mariner family.
“That’s why this decision was so easy,” he said. “These are Mariner employees, Mariner families — and we’re going to take care of our family.”
MLB commissioner Rob Manfred announced Tuesday that all 30 clubs would donate $1 million to help ballpark employees, but the Mariners have been working on a solution for much longer.
“These are high-anxiety times in our community, high anxiety times across the country right now,” Mather said. “So, we got together, started last week, and said let’s release some of their anxiety.”
The Mariners announced Tuesday afternoon the creation of a fund through their Mariners Care 501(c)(3) non-profit that will pay about 1,100 event staff workers through needs-based grants during the shutdown.
“Without hesitation, everybody stepped up and said, ‘We have to do the right thing for our community.’ It’s not about baseball right now,” Mather said. “And quite frankly we set it up inside our Mariners Care 501(c)(3) organization because we’re hoping other employees, we’re hoping players, we’re hoping season ticket holders, we’re hoping sponsors, we’re hoping a whole lot of people take this as an opportunity to do the right thing for our community, and help with some really troubling times for our hourly employees — our valuable hourly employees.
“We’re talking to our vendors, our concessionaire, our cleaning crew, and we’re having conversations with them about things that we’re going to do, letting them know what we’d like them to do. It’s an ongoing process. This is obviously going very quickly, but it was important to get it out there. ... There’s a lot to worry about, and let’s get this off the list.”
The needs-based grants will be issued to stadium workers based on mock schedules the Mariners have made, detailing how many games and how many hours a particular employee was going to work before the regular season was delayed.
Seattle’s organization had already planned to address this before the MLB shutdown, Mather said, as it appeared the Mariners’ opening seven-game homestand would be pushed out of Seattle anyway due to concerns about the virus.
While MLB’s planned contribution from each team is $1 million, Mather expects that number could increase.
“Quite frankly, we are expecting it to be more than $1 million,” he said. “We expect that this will gain momentum, and it’s the right thing to do. This community has always been so generous. Our ownership group has always been so generous. ... Let’s hope we’re back to playing baseball in the middle of May, and $1 million is ample.
“But, if it isn’t, people in this community are hurting, and we’ve been very blessed both in the front office and in our ownership group. In this community there are a lot of blessings. Let’s share it and make sure we take care of each other.”
This story was originally published March 17, 2020 at 1:20 PM.
