NEWS: Littleton voters say yes to Alumni Field

By Alexander Silva

May 03. 2016 3:21PM

Littleton voters say yes to Alumni Field

The Littleton annual and special Town Meeting was packed, May 2, to the point where people had to sit on the floor. Wicked Local Photo/Alexander Silva

After more than an hour of debate, voters at special Town Meeting appropriated funds for the renovation design of Alumni Field on Russell Street, but not without some restrictions.
Voters at annual Town Meeting, also approved a three-year moratorium on the use of crumb rubber infill for synthetic turf on town-owned land, forbidding the use of scrap tires and restricting the amount of maximum allowable lead content.
“This facility, folks, is inadequate for what we do,” Selectman Chuck DeCoste said. “And the fact that we have been able to be successful is a testament to our kids, to the parents, to the athletic director, the coaches, the Highway Department – for anybody that has anything to do with our sports programs succeeding.”
The votes passed by wide margins at the two back-to-back meetings, during which articles were taken out of order to deal with the field issue. The amended Alumni Field renovation design item passed, receiving 380 votes in favor and 165 votes opposed.
The amended moratorium article passed, receiving 275 votes in favor and 186 votes opposed.
Over 500 people packed into the Charles Kaye Gymnasium at Littleton Middle School for the annual and special Town Meetings, overflowing the bleachers to the point where people had to sit on the floor.
“Alumni Field in its current state cannot support the interscholastic sports program in a manner that we need it to,” School Committee Chairman Mike Fontanella said.
Alumni Field and the moratorium
A variety of amendments were proposed for both the Alumni Field renovation design item and resident Julie Rupp’s crumb rubber infill moratorium voter petition.
Each item had one amendment successfully passed.
The $234,593 Alumni Field design appropriation was amended to include wording requiring the design committee to consider both natural and synthetic turf options.
The moratorium wording was changed from saying “no lead” would be allowed in crumb rubber infill to a maximum lead content that’s “less than or equal to 50 parts-per-million,” which is the maximum allowable lead content for synthetic turf surfaces in California.
The restriction of no scrap tires contained in the infill was untouched.
“It’s almost sounds like it’s a trust thing, if things aren’t written in writing, no one believes things are going to happen,” resident Stephen Poulin said. “We’re a small town. Let’s work together, people, and get this done.”
Field maintenance in town
The Finance Committee and a number of citizens expressed concern over the lack of a maintenance plan to care for the town’s existing fields.
“As a Finance Committee, we’re always looking at long-term things,” Finance Committee Chairman Betsy Bohling said. “We want to make sure we can invest all this money, but we have to maintain it, what’s it going to cost, is there a commitment there to do that.”
Currently the Park and Recreation Department, School Committee and Highway Department have an agreement for maintenance of existing fields.
The Highway Department has two full-time employees that do park maintenance in addition to one or two seasonal summer workers dedicated to park maintenance from late May through the third week in August, according to Highway Operations Manager Jim Clyde.
But based on a department evaluation by the Collins Center at the University of Massachusetts Boston, Littleton should have even more employees taking care of its fields, Clyde said.
The industry standard is one employee for every 8 to 10 acres of developed parkland and the town has about 62 acres scattered around, according to Clyde.
Some residents questioned why the town would renovate Alumni Field with no maintenance plan in place.
“Unless we really have an idea of what is going to be included in this, it makes it difficult to say… take the money, just design something,” resident Harvey Atkins said. “It almost seems like you’re putting the cart before the horse.”
However, DeCoste said that any maintenance plan would come after design work is done.
“Maintenance is part of the execution,” DeCoste said. “This is part of the design.”
Follow reporter Alexander Silva on Twitter @IndieEagleWL.

http://littleton.wickedlocal.com/article/20160503/NEWS/160508739