BALTIMORE — City officials have reportedly solved Baltimore’s downtown economic problems with a revolutionary discovery:

You don’t need an economy if you have pickleball.

After roughly $35 million in Inner Harbor upgrades involving lawns, gardens, volleyball, a beach and a kayak launch, planners celebrated what experts are calling “the most expensive way possible to invent a park.”

Businesses wanted customers.

Residents wanted safety.

Employers wanted reasons to locate downtown.

City Hall heard all of that and said:

“Best we can do is a paddle.”

Officials insist the strategy will work because nothing attracts Fortune 500 headquarters quite like watching Kevin from accounting destroy his ACL chasing a plastic ball.

Retail vacancies?

Pickleball.

Crime concerns?

Kayak faster.

Convention decline?

Volleyball net.

Empty restaurants?

“Have you tried eating outside on the grass?”

One economic-development consultant reportedly presented the city’s new master plan:

BALTIMORE INNER HARBOR REVIVAL

1. Remove commerce.
2. Add lawn.
3. Add games usually found behind a retirement community.
4. Wait for Goldman Sachs to move in.

Critics asked where the new employers, restaurants, shops, and year-round attractions were.

Officials immediately planted another shrub.

Residents also raised concerns about downtown disorder.

City planners responded by pointing proudly toward the kayak launch.

“That’s why we made it waterfront,” explained one official. “If things get weird, paddle toward Anne Arundel County.”

The Canton Cat attempted to tour the improvements but became confused after realizing Baltimore had apparently spent millions transforming prime downtown waterfront property into something my neighborhood already has for free:

an empty lot where people hang around.

Still, officials remain optimistic.

The next phase of Baltimore’s economic comeback reportedly includes cornhole, giant Jenga, and a $14 million hammock district.

Because apparently the path back to a thriving downtown was never jobs, businesses, and customers.

It was summer camp for adults with municipal bonds.