Nonprofit youth sports organizations in Santa Clara are asking the city to reduce their fees for reserving fields, and officials are seeking a deal.
This year, Santa Clara began charging youth sports groups like the Santa Clara Westside Little League and the Police Activity League (PAL) $14 an hour to use city fields, contributing about $115,000 annually to the general fund. The city started charging a fee two years ago, and these groups said the fees are a financial burden on families and they want them reduced or eliminated entirely. The Santa Clara City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to eliminate the charges from July to December, giving city employees time to discuss fees and other access concerns with sports groups.
Councilor Raj Chahal said the revenue generated from field fees is negligible.
“The benefits for the community, for the children, for the families, are much more than $115,000, if you put an economic value on the benefits,” he told San José Spotlight.
Mike Walke, president of the PAL executive board, said the league received a bill from the city for nearly $14,000 for use of the fields during the softball regular season. The softball program has about 140 players, and dividing the total cost of field use by the number of players results in up to $100 per player, a cost that could be passed on to families as part of registration.
The cost has meant the league has had to find more creative ways to generate revenue, but the increasing financial strain is impacting parents who may not be able to afford higher costs.
“I hope they waive park usage fees for nonprofit groups, period,” Walke told San José Spotlight. “This started two years ago. It does not work. So I hope we get back to the way we were, where non-profit youth groups within the city don’t have to pay fees.”
The city has also maintained the Wade Brummal Youth Sports Scholarship since 2015, which imposes a $25 fee on non-Santa Clara residents participating in local sports groups to provide scholarships to residents who cannot afford them. About $152,000 has been saved, according to city data, although youth sports groups said the fund has a cumbersome application process for The Ford Family Foundation scholarships.
City spokeswoman Janine De la Vega said the city is inviting local youth sports nonprofits to a meeting in July to discuss these concerns before bringing them back to the city council in the fall. She said the city plans to review fees and possible revisions to the grant program. Walke said the league has a strong partnership with city employees, so she hopes to work with them to find a solution.
The city subsidizes $22.2 million, or 86%, of its $25.8 million in parks and recreation expenses, De la Vega said. The field use fee was initially collected to help the city recover some of the costs. The city is also considering a bond measure in November to help finance its $624 million infrastructure deficit.
Councilor Suds Jain said one of the benefits of charging for field use is that it ensures fields are not oversold. He said the scholarship fund should be better used and publicized to support families who can’t afford registration fees, but he worries that making the fields free to use will lead to them being abused.
“It’s not about a trivial amount of money from the general fund, but about (using) those fields…when they’re reserved,” Jain told San José Spotlight.
The Santa Clara Westside Little League pays for the use of fields owned by the city and local school districts, and league President Linda Pascoal said these fees add up to about half of the league’s total operating costs. . He said the league tries not to pass on the cost of field use to players, since the lower division registration fee is $200, but he expects the number of players registering to drop significantly in the coming years because of the increase. of costs.
“It’s such an insignificant amount of money compared to the overall (city) budget, but it’s not insignificant for groups like ours,” Pascoal told San José Spotlight.
Contact B. Sakura Cannestra at [email protected] or @SakuCannestra on X, formerly known as Twitter.
