Turf war: Who gets to use Westdale’s new soccer fields?
The city will not pay its share of the bill for a new Westdale Secondary School soccer pitch until public access to the field is guaranteed.
The Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board says it wants to resolve the turf war and create “clear expectations” for future projects.
The city agreed to put $150,000 toward a new soccer field at the westend school in 2015 as a result of a “participatory budget” vote of Ward 1 residents seeking improved neighbourhood green space.
But the natural turf playing surface and practice field built last year are surrounded by a protective fence and gates, which are locked after the school is closed. The school also limits field usage to a certain number of hours per week to keep the grass healthy.
That is the opposite of what residents expected, said Ryan Bender, who lives around the block and has written to both the school board and the city outlining his concerns.
“Before the renovations, people in the neighbourhood could use the field after hours . ... I used to take my daughter there to fly her kite. Now we’re gated out,” he said. “It’s really a shame to limit access to a wonderful neighbourhood green space like that because to me, it all looks like public land, public funds.”
Even during the summer, Bender said, he and his family were turned away from the field by a soccer team official who told them the club had negotiated priority rights with the school board.
That hasn’t stopped more determined, less law-abiding citizens from trying to use the field anyway. The Spectator found three different holes in the fence around the perimeter on the weekend. Two had been repaired, while one still offered tight-squeeze access.
Ward 1 Coun. Aidan Johnson, who is not running for re-election, raised
the “turf war” at his final council meeting last week. “Obviously there was an expectation of public access when (residents) voted to fund the project,” he said later.
He convinced council to withhold payment for its part of the construction until a “clear, written agreement” is reached with the board about public access.
The school board wants a formal agreement, too — ideally one that can be used as a blueprint for future partnerships, said board chair Todd White. “We just have to determine what that access looks like.”
The board paid about $1.2 million to build the irrigated highperformance soccer pitch and practice field, plus a track, at Westdale. The city’s contribution of $150,000 was for the practice field, he said.
White said the fence is necessary to prevent vandalism, protect the irrigation system and limit usage to about 35 hours per week to maintain the turf.
A neighbourhood group anticipated the fight over access ahead of construction, arguing in favour of an artificial turf field that would allow more after-hours usage. But a funding partner for the pricier project could not be found.
That means the main natural grass playing field must remain off limits to the public. But White expressed hope that the city and school board can find a way to allow public access to the practice field and track.
One option, he said, is to post public hours on a sign and have a school caretaker unlock the gate at those times. A similar system is used at other shared-use high school fields, like Sir Allan MacNab Secondary School. But that solution won’t help on weekends when school staff aren’t around.
It isn’t always this complicated. The city and school board have increasingly partnered on upgrading shared-use playgrounds or elementary school green spaces, for example. That’s easier, White said, because elementary schools typically don’t need highperformance sports fields.
He noted that the original ward vote to put money toward the field occurred largely without prior consultation with the board. “I think going forward, we all need clear expectations when we go into these projects.”