LAKE ELSINORE -- Finally.

Thirteen years after building a baseball stadium on the south side of town and after nearly five years of trying to figure out what to do with the 6,000-seat park, the city has reached an agreement with a partner who city officials say should help relieve them of a heavy financial burden.

The city's redevelopment agency, a legally distinct arm of city government that has the five-member City Council act as its board of directors, voted unanimously in closed session Tuesday to approve, in principle, a deal with the Lake Elsinore Storm that will have the minor-league baseball team take over the stadium's operations.

The city spends $800,000 a year operating and maintaining the facility, and city officials said after Tuesday's vote was announced that they were pleased that the city is finally getting rid of that burden. Along with the annual operating costs, the city spends $2 million per year paying off the debt it accrued to build the stadium.

Though the city will still have to make the debt payments, city officials were pleased to lighten some of the financial load.

"That is a problem that is off our backs," Councilman Bob Schiffner said. "This was quite a day for the city."

Storm President Dave Oster was just as pleased that the two sides were finally able to reach an agreement after six months of negotiations.

"We're definitely excited to be getting the opportunity," he said.

Under the terms of the agreement, which will have to be finalized at a later meeting, the Storm will take full operational control of the stadium. The deal will last for 10 years and will give the team the option of triggering two 5-year extensions.

Because the Storm is taking on such a heavy financial burden and is expected to lose money over the first several years it operates the stadium, the city will give the team $400,000 over the next four years. After that, the team is on its own.

Additionally, the city will be setting aside $300,000 a year for the next 10 years to be spent on capital improvements on the stadium. The team and the city will decide together how that money will be spent, city officials said.

Because the stadium has been such a financial drain on the city, said Councilman Thomas Buckley, who is also chairman of the redevelopment agency, it was important to work into the deal money for upgrades to the aging stadium.

In the end, Buckley said, the city will end up saving millions of dollars.

He also praised the Storm, which plays in the stadium 6 months out of the year, and said that they were the best suitor to take control of the ballpark.

"They are professional and they know what they are doing," he said.

With control of operations, the team will work to attract a wide range of events -- including festivals, swap meets, concerts, baseball tournaments, circuses and holiday celebrations -- to the stadium and market them.

That's something city officials have said all along they wanted.

Originally, the plan had been to sell the ballpark. But after negotiations with a group of developers and businessmen led by Storm owner Gary Jacobs went nowhere, city officials decided they wanted to keep the stadium and work out an operations and maintenance agreement with the team instead.

It was the second time in the last five years that the city failed to reach a sale agreement with a potential suitor. In 2003, a deal with a Temecula firm crumbled when city officials discovered that the company didn't have a viable plan nor the finances to hold up its end of the bargain.

City officials had been more optimistic about the more recent negotiations, saying that they were comfortable dealing with Jacobs, more of a known entity. After nearly a year of negotiations, a deal couldn't be worked out. But after talks broke off in September, city officials and team executives continued to talk about the operations deal.

City officials couldn't hold back their enthusiasm and optimism after they announced that an agreement had been reached.

"It was a big day for Lake Elsinore and a big day for the Storm," Buckley said.

- Contact staff writer Jose Carvajal at (951) 676-4315, Ext. 2624, or jcarvajal@californian.com.