Clark Field Allocation
Questions/Discussion from Commission
Lisa Lynn: Clark Field remains only lighted field in the City. Currently, the demand for its use far outweighs its availability. Three main user groups:
- Hermosa Beach Little League
- AYSO Region 18 Youth Soccer
- Hermosa Beach Adult Softball League
All three user groups have been invited here tonight to address their concerns. Each group has demanded more time than we currently allocate to them. We juggle with the allocation and give priority allocation to each youth group in its traditional season. The Adult Softball league plays year round intermittent with those seasons. Some of the participants are here this evening to address their concerns to the Commission.
Bell: what is the latest we can keep South Park open?
Lisa Lynn: 10:00 P.M.
Francis: Before we bring up this discussion between ourselves, we should hear these people speak. Are we in agreement?
All Ayes.
Adult Softball:
Mike Butler: Resident, homeowner, father, husband. 1249 20th Place. A member of Shark’s Cove Wednesday night softball. I am not speaking against Little league. We are looking for balanced use of the field. Adult Softball only uses 8 hours out of the week, 2/3 of the time is past when Little League would be using the field (7:30 p.m.-10:00p.m.) We use the exact same dimensions, 60 foot bases. No one is abusing the field. Adult Softball has turned away many teams for a number of years. What is currently on the board, to shut it down completely except for a very small part of the year, seems draconian.
Francis: Do any Commissioners have any questions?
Cannella: Do you use any other time other than the 8 hour game time for practice?
Butler: No. We sometimes use other areas that are open on other fields. Being the only lighted field, there are no other options. Wilson is very far away with same residency requirements. To get from work to make 6:15 game is pretty much impossible. Manhattan Beach, outside South Bay, same problems getting from work, traffic and local area.
Cannella: What nights and hours do you play?
Butler: Wednesdays, 6:15 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. There are three games: 6:15, 7:30, and 8:45. Rick sticks to curfew. Lights go out automatically at 10:00 p.m. Sundays, same times. D League on Wednesday, C League on Sunday.
Francis: Do we have any co-ed leagues in Hermosa?
Dennis Hrboka: Adult Sports League Coordinator for City. Coordinates Adult Softball. We run co-ed leagues in the summertime. We could run it year round. I have turned away 12 teams for Adult Softball, for Men’s Softball. We could run it all the time if we had field usage. A lot of these guys are from the City of Hermosa Beach. They all get sponsored by the businesses in Hermosa Beach and they have been playing for a long time, some for 20 years plus.
Francis: My history at that field goes back at least 20 years. I spent 15 years at Little League. I know that the City gets a lot of “bang for its buck” out of that park. Not financially, but the facility being used by its residents. I appreciate the work that you did. I know that that is probably not a fun job.
Cannella: Most of the adult teams are sponsored by local businesses?
Hrboka: Yes.
AYSO:
Russ Allen, AYSO. This is not going to affect us. We have worked out our season with this blanket reservation for the last umpteen years. We have been fairly amicable with baseball in that we have given them the blocks of time that we don’t use. We give them the weekends for the games, we give them Friday and Saturday nights. We would like to maintain and keep our current blanket reservation with the caveat that at any time we can give the fields to baseball. This year our participation has grown from 3,300 kids to 3,600 kids. I don’t know exactly how many are Hermosa Beach kids, but we were at 700 Hermosa Beach kids. This field is the only field we can use after 8:00 p.m. because the Manhattan Beach rules are that youth stops at 8:00 p.m. This is the only field during week days that we can use until 10:00 p.m. It is the largest field, consequently our oldest kids play there. Our under 19 and under 16 groups practice there. We have been asking is to have Wednesday nights returned to us, which is the night Adult Softball uses. We would love to have that back because getting an 18 year old high school girl to practice on Friday night at 8:00 is very difficult, as you can imagine. We would like to keep our blanket reservation and be back on Clark Field on Wednesday night.
Bell: You talk to Dante now when you have time to give back?
Allen: Occasionally we talk directly to baseball and soccer and occasionally it goes through Dante (Pagulayan). If we talk directly to Little League we always inform Dante. The City has final say on anything that goes on.
Hollander: What is the composition of your teams in terms of boys and girls?
Allen: We have approximately 50% boys and 50% girls. It varies by ages. Girls under 10 are our biggest group. Boys start to drop off at 10. There is a bigger drop of in girls from 10 to 12. It may not be exactly 50/50 in each age group but it is approximately 50/50 throughout the entire program.
Francis: This is the whole South Bay area. The teams are made up of kids from all over the South Bay?
Allen: The region, 18, is Hermosa Beach and Manhattan Beach. We have open enrollment. If you live in Huntington Beach and you want to drive up here for practice and play you are welcome to do that. We don’t exclude. There is a different region for North Redondo, South Redondo, Hawthorne, El Segundo. Our season is Labor Day to middle of December. In Hermosa we don’t open up Clark until the day after Labor Day.
Little League:
Morri Mohr, President, Michael Baer, Vice President, Hermosa Beach Little League: I would like to clear up one thing in the letter. It does say that our written request would affect the time allocated to Adult Softball and AYSO. But it won’t affect AYSO.
Lisa Lynn: Clarify. It says in the letter “from September through November you would anticipate needing Clark a couple of nights a week and Sunday afternoons.”
Morri Mohr: I do not know where that came from, but that is incorrect.
Lisa Lynn: That is from the Hermosa Beach Little League Board of Director’s letter.
Mohr: That is incorrect. It can be amended. We are asking for usage of Clark field baseball facility through our regular season, which would be March through June 15.
Baer: There is also a request for are a couple of nights during the week from September through November, as well as Sundays for games. There is a fall program that runs throughout this area and we get excluded from it because we don’t have a field that other teams can participate on.
Mohr: We have a great working relationship with AYSO, specifically Russ Allen. It has not been a problem getting the time we need. We don’t need to have anything altered officially during that time period.
Francis: That changes the dates we have here, basically you won’t conflict with AYSO?
Mohr: No. Again I want to stress that we are here tonight based on the sheer numbers of our league and the growing we have been doing over the last 7-8 years. Last year we reached a critical point where it was difficult to schedule the amount of games we needed to play based on the sheer enrollment of kids. I fully understand that Clark Stadium is the one field that our City has. I was born, raised in Hermosa Beach and when I was a kid I played Little League at Clark Stadium. I have a long history with the field and am fully aware of its usage. This is nothing against Adult Softball. This is sheer numbers. Looking at the data we have submitted, if we had to pick, we would like to have the field during our regular season. If we eliminated Adult Softball on one day versus two, Sunday would be the day that we would ask to be given to the Little League. It comes down to game time, not practice times. You have a schedule in front of you. The Sunday games begin at 8:00 a.m.. There are guys dressing the field as early as 6:30 a.m. We go 15 min between each game. Each game is an hour and 50 min. and it is very regimented. The good news about what Hermosa Beach Little League is doing is we are signing up new kids each year, and we are keeping them. There used to be a big drop off between the 7-8 year old division and the 9-10 year old. Based on the Board’s efforts we are growing and keeping the older kids. The older kids are the kids that need the time at night, specifically the 13-14 year olds. Those are the kids that get affected the most by lack of field space, specifically game time late at night. The 9-10 year olds can’t play past 7:00. It is the older kids that are getting ready to play high school ball that struggle to find game slots. We find ourselves at the whim of other leagues, other divisions that can give us field space.
Baer: And it’s not just game time its practice time. Those kids can’t go to Valley School, View School or Hermosa Valley Park and practice. The fields aren’t big enough. If they hit a ball and it goes in somebody’s yard and breaks a window, who is responsible? It’s them.
Mohr: I have the demographics. Out of 2006, the amount of kids we have enrolled and families involved, are primarily Hermosa families. The kids that are not, played in Hermosa or once lived in Hermosa and have moved out and their parents are still active in the league. In closing, last year we were stretched to the hilt for game time. If our enrollment increases at the same percentage it has over the past few years, we’re not sure what we’ll do. None of our options are good. We can turn kids away or increase the team size to 15 kids per team. I wouldn’t want to do this. Teams now are 12. For the lower divisions, the Farm, 5-7 yr olds there are 13-14. As we get into Farm where the coach pitches, real baseball, three outs, there are 12 sometimes 13 on a team. The 9-10 year olds have 11 to 12. Last year, our Junior Division, we had 16 kids on two teams. We could have had four teams but we didn’t have space to play them.
Francis: I have a couple of questions since you brought up age. Farm is how old? Wwhat age do T-ballers start?
Mohr: Farm is 7-8, T-ballers start at 5. These are ages mandated by the League.
Francis: What is “Junior”? That is a new term to me.
Mohr: Junior is part of Little league International. It is the Division above Major, above what you see in the Little league World Series. Those are the 11-12 year olds. Junior is the next level up, 13-14 yr olds. It is the Division between 7th & 8th graders before they go to High School. Seniors is officially a division in the League, which is 15-16. It is more of a summer program post high school season.
Cannella: The teams that play at night, what age does not play past 7:00 p.m.?
Mohr: The 9-10 year olds. The group that grew the most. We are primarily addressing the 9-14 year olds. 9-10 is a Minor Division, 11-12 Major Division.
Canella: You are looking for nighttime space. I am seeing five teams that can play past seven? Is that correct?
Mohr: We have four Major teams and we had 16 kids on two teams for the Junior Division, in the Minors.
Cannella: You want the whole entire week and exclude men’s baseball but you would give them Wednesday night. You want six nights total during your season. I understand that. The amount of teams right here, I don’t see why it is a problem to schedule that, unless you are looking at the future and what’s going to happen, the future that is not here yet.
Mohr: Based on the schedule, we are at the minimum time allowed by Little League. We co-play with all the Redondo Leagues at the Minor, Major and Junior Divisions. That doesn’t effect field time whatsoever. If anything, it frees up some field time. We still had no gaps. The girl’s softball doesn’t even get to play at Hermosa. They have to play at Manhattan. So the older girls 11-12 and up, due to lack of field space can’t even play at Clark.
Cannella: How is that working? Is there anyone here to elaborate on how that is going?
Allen: The girl’s softball in Manhattan Beach is doing OK. AYSO granted them space. We just moved entire girls under 7 Division, half of all their games, just so girl’s softball could play on Sunday evening. With cooperation it can work.
Mohr: The hardest thing for me every year, as Commissioner of the Division, is to tell them that they (girl’s softball) have to find their own place to play. We have an individual that heads up the softball division and he’s at the mercy of that league to give them time, time that they don’t use for their baseball program. It is not the most opportune time, early in the morning or late in the day. But yes, it is working. As a Hermosa League, I would like to make time for them to play in their home field.
Baer: These kids that are playing baseball have no other place to go. They can’t go to Manhattan and play and participate due to district guidelines. We are governed by guidelines and we have to stick to them. It is much more strict now. There is an occasional waiver. Usually for someone who has moved. South and Central Redondo are in a literal feud. Someone is going to lose their charter. It can be a big deal if you don’t pay attention to it.
Sigler: Is there anyway that some of these games on Saturday, could some of these be played at the schools to free up time?
Mohr: This all comes down to the Major diamond. During a regular weekend day we’re playing at all corners of the field. The T-ballers play over by the Clark building on the “all grass” area, the Farm kids play on the southern-most diamond, the one without the mound. We’re looking at the Major diamond where the bigger kids have to play. Coincidentally that’s where softball needs to play too.
Sigler: I am just thinking that there are other schools around that have fields. I have to imagine those fields could be worked in with some of these. That way Softball could keep their field.
Mohr: We have spent hours and hours trying to work that out. There aren’t any adult fields. I did a breakdown of all the leagues in the district taking into consideration how many fields they have to play on and how many kids are in each individual league. This is 10 teams from Palos Verdes to El Segundo. On a weekly basis, and this was four years ago, we put over 500 kids through on one of those Major diamonds throughout the course of the week. Practices and games. The next highest one was 190. It is solely because the other Leagues, every one of them, have a designated field solely for Little League or youth baseball. At least one, some have two. This is the only field we have. If you look at the other Leagues around, they are open, but most don’t have lights and that accounts for a lot.
Canella: When you say “all those teams”, you are also including, because your team plays in a league, a co-op with Redondo, those teams are coming over. It is not necessarily the Hermosa team playing at the diamond during the season.
Mohr: Correct. We co-play with them. Part of the co-play responsibility is that you have to bring a game slot for every team that you co-play. If we have seven teams in a division we have to have seven spots for that division or we can’t do it.
Francis: I know you have looked everywhere and have turned over every stone looking for anything extra you can do.
Baer: You can see (on the schedule) that we are back to back. One of our issues is safety. We can’t get out and drag the field between games because there is no time. The kids do not get to take infield like they should be doing as part of baseball before a game. They play catch and start a game without being able to address the whole infield to make it right for them to play on. I know that Mr. Flaherty can attest to that. By the end of the season it is concrete out there.
Hollander: It is a shame that we have such a small capability. What would be the big problem in increasing the size of the teams? So they don’t get to play the full game? They rotate a little bit? If that is something that is necessary, why is that such an issue?
Mohr: If you take the Minor Division, at seven teams last year, a record number for us, those games go four innings. If you have 15 kids on a team, each kid would get to play probably two innings. In my opinion that would be a disservice to the family who pays $125 for their kid to play baseball. I know it has been done in the past and it is something I would try to avoid at all costs.
Baer: If you are going to ask us to put 15 kids on a team, why not ask soccer to put 15 kids on a team? Reduce the demand of the use of all the fields.
Hollander: you guys have been so successful, but we have to be able to share the field. It is not just one access field. 8 hours is not a lot. I feel very strongly that there are other segments in this community that deserve the use of the field too. That is my view.
Baer: We are the only sport that this is the only place we can play an official game. 8 hours, it may not seem like a lot a week, but it is. It could be 8 hours of practice or four games.
Mohr: The Sunday slot is crucial in one respect. We are mandated to have the teams in certain divisions to play two games a week. We have one midweek game and all the other games are on Saturday and Sunday. That is so that every team is allowed practice one day a week at Clark. That is the upper division teams. In order to get two games in a week, even co-playing, that Sunday afternoon game is crucial. I realize we would only have four hours but we would use every second of it.
Bell: Is there another weekday you would give up if you were to take Sunday?
Mohr: It would be like robbing Peter to pay Paul. We would eliminate practices, substitute games.
Baer: The problem with those 8 hours is we can’t be on the field. They have the whole field to themselves. Even though we could go back in the Southeast corner and just practice, we are not allowed on the field.
Francis: The Southeast corner, meaning the grass field with the backstop?
Baer: Yes. Currently where the T-ball play.
Francis: You can’t have a practice there while a game is going on?
Baer: We’re not allowed on the field during Adult Softball. And we shouldn’t be for safety reasons.
Sigler: I played in the co-ed softball league. I have been playing sports since I was four years old. I have played in hundreds of leagues and I have never played in a league where there is just four teams. The reason there is just four teams is lack of space and lack of time Adult Softball has. I would have a hard time justifying giving time away from Adult Softball because there are a lot of different teams that want to play that can’t do it. It would be tough to justify taking away Sunday night so that the adults in town only have one night to play softball and then you probably wouldn’t even have a co-ed league. I really enjoy playing.
Francis: When we re-designed Valley Park a few years back, we designed the Southeast corner for T-ball use but also in the bathroom area designed a roll-up to be a snack stand. Moving T-ball away from Clark Field, would that free up any time?
Mohr: No because we are dealing with older divisions. It would have no effect at all. Not for the weekend usage at Clark.
Francis: How about making that a practice facility for your Farm teams?
Mohr: It already is.
Francis: But you have Farm, 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 Farm teams practicing here. They practice on the Farm field?
Mohr: The have two practices a week. One of them is on the Farm field and one of them is at the other fields in the City. That might be an older schedule. What happened last year is that a lot of the Farm teams got bumped off the Farm field because the Minor teams had to come down and take it.
Canella: Does Redondo allow you any practice on their fields?
Mohr: No. If you look at the three Redondo teams, South, Central and North. Central and North have lights but they have one field. They are basically scraping to get by themselves. The other leagues are small compared to ours. South can’t even participate in co-play until after daylight savings time because that is when they can have more time on their field. I understand the dilemma. Little league is going to continue to grow. I have labored over the schedules. This has been building, not just this year, but for several years. I feel that the majority of Hermosa Beach Little League is Hermosa Beach residents. Nearly 400 children and families. That is unique among the users of Clark Field. I would ask that you take that into consideration. I will always be open to options. I don’t see any other than turning kids away or adding to the teams.
Francis: Any other questions?
Allen: You said (Commissioner Cannella) you had a child under 14 and you are on your fourth field. That is directly because Clark is closed to us this year. Unfortunately for us, the maintenance or improvements to Clark exactly coincide with our soccer season.
Canella: To be fair, he plays club soccer.
Allen: AYSO Board asked us to cut back on our teams under 16 and under 19 this year because we cannot provide enough field space. I don’t know if you can appreciate what a coup it is to get a 16 year old or 18 year old to come and play sports as opposed to hanging out in a mall someplace. We have had to reorganize all the teams, under 14 specifically have been moved around constantly. There used to be a club team named Hurricane which was Hermosa Beach/Manhattan Beach. It has since merged with Torrance/Redondo and has become South Bay Soccer Club but they’re the team that’s lost out. We took away a weekend game day from them and two weekday practice times. Clark Field is a major impact. Since they (Little League) will amend the letter to exclude the fall, it won’t make a difference. If they don’t amend the letter, I want you to know that Clark Field is incredibly important to the soccer club.
Rick Roberts: I played and umpired in Hermosa Softball for 25 yrs. I have been here a long time. The other gentleman said that we “make them get off the field”. We give the Little League room and the kids that play soccer room. We just don’t give them space to come in where the fielders are. They do have some space there. We don’t make them get off the whole field. He said they “can’t practice at Hermosa Valley” or other places because they could hit the ball and break windows. It isn’t all about hitting the ball 300 feet. You can practice in an area where you can practice infield, pop flies. If you want to practice hitting, make that time for Clark or someplace where there is the room. There is room for these kids to practice. It isn’t all about getting up there, hitting the ball and breaking windows. In all the years I have lived here, worked here, paid taxes here, this is for everybody. This is recreation for everybody not for an individual group. All of us. You can’t take away form the masses to give to an individual group. We love it. Everybody’s been here for the longest time. Guys keep coming back. It’s a great thing.
Hollander: Are the majority of your players Hermosa residents?
Rick: Yes. They most certainly are. As an umpire I’ve come onto the field when they’ve been there, on Wednesdays. Generally everything is fine. I have had my moments when I have had major difficulty getting some of those teams off the field and the coaches have been less than helpful in getting it done. I have had my problems with a few of them. They haven’t been very nice about it. I understand. I think we all understand.
Jeff Nicosia: I live in Hawthorne. I coach a team that is made up of 90% Hermosa residents. I’ve coached the same team for eight years. The big thing for us is losing Sunday night. We have tried to play other nights and we can’t. We are all professionals. I work in an ad agency, I’m the creative director, I have lawyers on my team, I have doctors on my team. These are all residents, taxpayers. If we don’t play on Sunday nights we can’t play. We can only play on that field. Little League has stated that they can only play on that field. As a parent of two kids that play soccer and T-ball, I don’t agree with that. This is the only field big enough for adults. We would love to play on another field if we could, but there isn’t another field big enough for Adult League Softball. It can’t be about one group taking away AYSO, taking away Adult League Softball. I feel for these guys. My kids play for AYSO in Hermosa and every other week they are told to go to a different field. My children all play on different fields, practices and games. I get the lack of fields in this area. The field should be for everybody. The teams, Sunday night league, in eight years the same teams play season after season, year after year. We play three seasons a year. It is a good source of money, $500 a team. We see the same people coming over and over. They just love it and it’s an important thing. Especially Sundays.
Canella: So the Men’s Softball plays three times a year. Three seasons. How many games a season, 10 games? 3 ten game seasons a year. How does that affect March through June. That is what Little League is looking for. Do you have an overlapping season. Are you between seasons?
Hrboka: We shut down for maintenance January-February and start again in March. We start in March and go into June. It is just one season affected, plus playoffs.
Baer: I’ve been kicked off the field on Wednesday nights coaching an All Star team because I was hitting ground balls on the Southwest field. I’ve been spoken to by Adult Softball asking us to get off the field. For them to say they have allowed us to be on the field...
Mohr: We are mandated to be off the field.
Lisa Lynn: The two groups should not be on the field at the same time for safety reasons.
Mohr: Softball now has three 10 week seasons. Our season is about 19-20 weeks to get our 20 game season in. That’s including playoffs. If you took one Sunday time away, on a yearly basis, they (Adult Softball) would still have more usage than Little League. On an annual basis they would still have the field more than us.
Sigler: Would it be possible for you to go into July instead of ending in June?
Mohr: We go into July. There are other things that are established with Little League such as Tournament of Champions and All Star Tournaments that start at a certain time, June 15 about, when those teams can first practice. We are talking one team. Adult Softball can start after the first week of June when our regular season ends. Then it is just the four or five All Star teams that are practicing. On occasion we host the Tournament of Champions as it gets spread around the district. Right now we are prohibited from hosting an All Star team. We could if we had the field through July. That has to figure into Softball and AYSO. Little League puts considerable funds back into the fields every year including rebuilding the snack stand which is close to $80,000. That’s all approved and we’re on the cusp of doing that right now. We reinvest in the field every year a minimum of $3,000 to $5,000 leveling, regarding. Mike (Flaherty) and the City help us out tremendously. We couldn’t do it without a partnership. The League does reinvest significant funds every year.
Francis: Anyone else? OK, we’ll close the public comment on this. I want to thank everyone for coming. All have spoken eloquently about your cause and I appreciate that. We have a difficult decision to make. Robert and I were involved in Hermosa Beach Little League for years and years. I understand your scheduling issues. When I started with the League we had under 300 and went over 300 during that time. We were about 330 at the time I left. I also had two daughters in there and was involved with the co-play scheduling with Redondo and Manhattan Beach and dealing with trying to get field space with other leagues. I understand all those issues. The first Little League charter in the South Bay was Hermosa Beach. We have a lot of history in this Hermosa Little League. We are trying to be sensitive to everyone’s needs. Any decision we make tonight, we are trying to weigh the needs of the community and not the needs of any one individual. Please keep that in mind.
Sigler: If you limit Softball to one night you are excluding an entire segment of the population of Hermosa Beach. I understand the importance of Little League. I played from five to seventeen, but the field has to be available to all ages. I am in favor of keeping it as it is right now.
Hollander: Little League has been so successful. That is the issue here. You have managed it so well all these years. We have all been very supportive of Little League. The City has been supportive of Little league. In terms of the way it is priced out, if you look at comparative pricing of the groups, you have 1100 hours and $4,000 goes to the City. 80 hours, $15,000 comes back to the City. For AYSO, 812 hours, $3,700 comes back to the City. Those funds obviously go back into the servicing of the facility. I am intent on sharing the facility. Everybody here needs that park. They need the lighted area. To exclude anyone from it, especially eight hours, is not asking too much when we have a limited resource. I would love to come up with some other alternative in terms of a lighted park. We just don’t have one. I think that sharing is the only way to go.
Bell: Steve(Burrell, City Manager) said that we have to accommodate the needs of the Community and the Community needs another field. Adult Softball has a place. It has been here a long time and it serves a vital part of our Community. You are Hermosans and you need a place to play. So does Little League and AYSO. We have to accommodate with what we have. The way it is structured now is the best that it can be given the amount of hours in the day. I am for keeping it as is.
Cannella: I played baseball all my life and Adult Baseball on two teams a week. I’m glad this doesn’t affect Soccer. Adult Men’s League, 8 hours is nothing. That league has been in here over 20 years. My neighbors play in it. You guys can come back next year. I don’t want to throw this under. I want to go out and see how this is working because baseball, the statistics that I had, Little League was losing kids. It is totally a different thing here, and I am glad to hear that, if that’s the case. Unfortunately it’s going to have to stay the same right now. We have to accommodate everybody. It is a public park. It is recreation.
Francis: Thank you Commissioners. I’ve got to tell you my commitment to Little League over the years. I striped the field at 7:00 a.m. I worked the snack stand and have done all those things. It breaks my heart not to be able to give you more time at Clark Field. I hope that in the future, in Hermosa Beach, we are able to provide some more field space. Take some of the Farm play out to free up more space. Put a Farm size diamond in. We could take T-ball away, but that doesn’t affect you. I know the argument against that, when we first discussed it, was that the families wanted to stay at Clark. There is not another city in the South Bay that has that convenience. Everyone’s league is split onto different fields. At some point that is going to have to happen here in Hermosa Beach.
Francis: Call for a MOTION
Sigler: I make a motion to leave the Field Allocation as is.
Seconded by Hollander.
All Ayes
Francis: That is our recommendation to City Council.
Lisa Lynn: O.K. We do have good news about the field. Mike Flaherty is here, Superintendent of Public Works. He can give everyone an update on the renovations. I hope that this will help with our problem because we are working on the Southeast corner there.
Mike Flaherty: We are well under way with about a quarter million dollar project including all new infields, leveling both southwest & northwest corners, new backstop in the southwest corner, all new irrigation, and all new lawn. We are going to sod it. We are on schedule and we will have it open and ready for Little League opening the last week of February or first week of March. In the future we’re looking at a new lighting project, around $400,000 to change and modify and bring in new lighting. The lighting today in that field is working with gum and shoestrings. We’re about ready to make that proposal in the next two years. The real major change is getting in a new irrigation system. It will do a substantial job of maintaining that field. Because of the heavy schedule that we have, we can’t get significant down time. We have the least amount of down time of any park in the South Bay. I’ve talked to all my Superintendents in Manhattan, Redondo, Torrance and none of them have this kind of scheduling problem. Annual cost on this field is $40,000. About $20,000 for electrical lighting, another $8,000 for contract services, $9,000 for water and $3,000 miscellaneous to replace light bulbs. We are real happy to have a brand new engineer with the City who is heading this project up, Ken Lindsey. It’s going to be an excellent finished product. We’re hoping to use this as a stepping stone to the goal of new lighting to add a value to all the leagues in the neighborhood. One of the biggest complaints we’ve got is the overspray of light going into neighbors. I feel confident we will be on schedule, on time and within budget. We don’t say that very often.
Francis: In replacing the backstop at the Southwest corner. Is it going to be enlarged?
Flaherty: Yes. We have two game plans. Ken and I worked on it today. We may not put in the back stop we originally scheduled,. The one we’re looking at today is similar to the one in the Northwest comer.
Francis: We are going to put sod back in the infield?
Flaherty: No. There is no sod in the infield. Both the infields will be clay. A D-G clay mixture. It will not be a grass infield. The irrigation is built to allow a future irrigation project on the hillside, on the North side and the West side and potential if we go that way. If you dig in that infield today it looks like you go into an archeological dig. There are at least 10 different levels of dirt, where we had sod, no sod, sod, no sod. I put in sod myself three separate times.
Francis: One of the things I always wanted to see on that field was to have that Southwest corner enlarged, lighted and put the Adult Softball over there and use the Major League field as Little League only for Majors and Juniors and put the grass back in there. If you get a kid 13 years old hitting a hard ball on the ground that is not a good situation.
Flaherty: The good news on the Southwest corner is that we are working on it right now. The way we are going to skin it, and enlarge that diamond, it will accommodate both Little League and slow pitch with the size of the dirt. It will be a significantly larger diamond than it is today. I think the facilities that we bring to it such as a larger backstop will allow a transition. We are several years away from that because, until we provide lighting, you can’t have softball.
Francis: I understand, but we have to have goals, things to look forward to. Plus, any of you who have ever played left field in the Men’s League at dusk would appreciate having that other diamond being used. Pitcher and third baseman too. I played third base thre and I was so afraid they’d hit me a line drive because I couldn’t see. Those are things I’d like to have discussed as we move forward with that project. We have a tour scheduled as Commissioners and that park will be on the tour. We really need to walk that facility.
Flaherty: One of the things we're looking at for the future is building a new sewer line to accommodate a larger snack stand and future repair of the bathrooms. That’s significant, even though it’s all infrastructure. I don’t think there’s been one Little League grand opening day where I have not cleaned out the sewers and stopped toilets. Those are the things we’re looking at several years in advance.
Francis: Thank you Mike, Lisa. That was, as we said, heart wrenching. Thank everyone for taking time out of their busy schedule to come down here and address this issue with us.
