CTV News: New sports field fees could go to needed maintenance

by | Jun 14, 2012

Bloordale Baseball President Patrick McConnell was interviewed by CTV news yesterday regarding the proposed User Permit Fees for baseball diamonds and soccer pitches. The news crew was at Millwood Park and broadcast this story live on the 6 pm local newscast.

During the interview, Patrick also commented on the following items but unfortunately, as news works, not all things make it into the story.
• The baseball leagues are grateful for the past four months of dialogue and relationship building with city parks staff. A real co-operative spirit has been developed with the leagues and city staff and I stressed we need to continue to work together to find creative solutions to challenges being faced by the city and the leagues. Patrick noted the hourly fee is just one option being brought forward to city council. It is not the best one in our view. There are other options out there if we continue to work together.
• Patrick stressed the work volunteers do to maintain diamonds and the financial resources that leagues across the city put into improving and maintaining city-owned assets.
• Millwood is a pretty good looking park because of volunteers. There are many diamonds across the city that do not have the volunteer base nor the fundraising opportunities to maintain diamonds and have to rely on the city to do so. To date, the city has not been doing a good job of this — a fact the city has conceded to in the report during meetings and in the interview with CTV news.
• Patrick stressed it is a hard sell for us to have to tell our families to take a leap of faith, pay the fee for 2013 and beyond, and believe everything will be better when the track record has suggested otherwise.
• Patrick also mentioned the additional lighting fee and the need for a financial relief mechanism for those leagues in economically challenged neighborhoods and that if a user fee is imposed on them, they will likely shut down. (We have evidence of the that in Rexdale were numbers dropped significantly with a fee increase in 2012.) Instead of keeping kids in sports and benefiting from all the life skills team sports help promote, the city user fee shutting down the leagues will effectively push kids into possibly less desirable activities.
• Patrick explained the time booking issues (referred to by the city has Block Booking), impact of the additional cost of lighting ($40 per night), and the need for twice annual field audits to track to the city’s work on the diamonds and pitches.

Bloordale, along with its partner leagues in Etobicoke and across Toronto, will continue to work with the Toronto Sports Council in an effort to find the best resolution possible to the proposed permit user fees. City Council is expected to vote on this issue during its meeting July 11.
Bloordale will keep you informed of our efforts and will let you know how you can help in the future.
For background on this issue, please CLICK HERE for details on the city staff recommendation to council and a summary of the staff report.
If you have any comments, please forward them to [email protected]

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