Tom Knott: Throw these bums out?

The Nationals have not been evicted from the taxpayers’ ballpark yet, with their belongings strewn about on Half Street.

That is what usually happens to those who fall behind on their rental payments, as is the case with the Lerner family.

And it is not as if the Lerner family does not have the money to pay rent to the city.

The Lerner family merely believes it should not have to part with rent money after the city’s construction crews failed to meet certain timetables with the building of the first-year ballpark.

The team’s executive office space at the ballpark was not completed until three weeks after Opening Day, which perhaps explains why the Lerner family is seeking $100,000 a day in damages, dating from March 1.

The Lerner family and the team’s other bigwigs undoubtedly were psychologically traumatized after being forced to spend an extra three weeks in the dank facilities at RFK Stadium.

Predictably enough, both sides are gearing up for a protracted legal battle, assuming the Lerner family is mentally up for it after all the bad stuff the city has done to them.

The city spent only $611 million of the public’s money to build the ballpark and then did not have the decency to meet each of the construction deadlines.

This often happens in the construction business. These tiny details usually fall under cost overruns.

The Lerner family, being developers, should know this.

Eight members of the D.C. Council have hit upon a novel idea to ease the city’s potential cash-flow problems while the Lerner family refuses to pay rent on the ballpark, which is to increase the sales tax from 10 to 15 percent on concessions.

This unusual idea undoubtedly would hurt the small-business owners trying to scratch out a living at the ballpark, which is how it always works in this instinctively ultra-liberal city.

In theory, the city’s power structure and residents embrace small-business owners and are distrustful of corporate America. But in practice, the city’s leadership sticks it to small-business owners and lures big-box retailers with tax breaks and incentives. And it is a leadership voted into office by an electorate that swoons over small businesses until it is time to actually patronize one.

The Lerner family, in taking an unyielding approach with the city, seemingly has no choice but to issue partial rebates to the team’s ticket-buying public.

Fair is fair, after all. As hard as the construction delays have been on the Lerner family, it has been equally hard on the team’s supporters. And while the Lerners are at it, they ought to put a dollar figure on the suffering the team’s fans have endured this baseball season.

It cannot be fun to pay to sit down in a half-completed ballpark to watch a half-completed baseball team perform at the Class AA level.

And it is no fun to see tax-and-spend politicians and a wealthy ownership go at it because you can be certain, whatever the resolution, the cost will be passed along to taxpayers and the martyrs who go to the ballpark to watch bad baseball.

Until the city and the Lerner family can reach an agreement, the Nationals should be barred from the premises of the new ballpark and ordered to make do at any number of the ball fields around the city.

For instance, the Guy Mason ball diamond on Wisconsin Avenue in Northwest is equipped with lights and a grassy hillside, where fans could sit among the rats that burrow in the soil. Vendors could sell sautéed rat instead of hot dogs to the culinary adventurous.

Otherwise, it is unfair that a poor family is being evicted from its home somewhere in the city today while the Nationals continue to merit a free pass.

The solution could not be more obvious.

Throw the ball team out on the street and use the ballpark as a homeless shelter.