PRESS RELEASE: For Immediate Release

January 18, 2007

Validity of Survey on Flint Park Turf Field is Questioned

      A survey and letter mailed this week by the Flint Park Conservancy to hundreds of local residents contained false and misleading statements regarding the Village of Larchmont’s proposal to build a turf field in Flint Park.

The survey was an effort by the Conservancy to solicit citizen input about the Larchmont Village Board’s proposal to install an artificial turf field. But false statements about the impact of the field on parking, the conservation area, the picnic area, the total number of other fields at Flint, the trees and other landscaping, the fence, the conditions of obtaining funding from the county, the total budget for the project, and seating means that people who respond to the survey will be doing so based on erroneous or missing information.

     “While we support the idea of a survey to elicit community input,” said Jim Hanley, President of Fields for Kids, “this particular survey, because of the way it is written and the misinformation contained within the letter, might not accurately reflect what Conservancy members really want to see at Flint Park.”

The Village has had two standing-room only public working sessions since December where the Flint Park field proposal was presented and citizens were encouraged to give input. Prior to that, since September, the Village of Larchmont as well as the other two municipalities and School District have had significant public discussions about fields at just about all of their meetings.

“We were surprised to see that the Conservancy letter and survey neglected to mention any of the benefits of the plan,” said Nancy Gardiner, Vice President of Fields for Kids, “ including better drainage in all the fields, and better pedestrian and bicycle safety through enhanced pathways. The main benefit—that this is a new varsity-sized, multi-sport field that is desperately needed to accommodate the growing number of participants in field sports—isn’t discussed at all.”

Corrections to some of the factual inaccuracies in the survey and letter follow:

•In response to a public meeting on January 8, additional parking in the park has been greatly reduced to encourage residents to walk into the park.

•The proposal, which includes reconfiguration of the fields on the South side of the park road, would actually increase the size of the water front conservation area, not decrease it when compared to the plan approved by the Conservancy in 2005.

•The current plan includes more than 100 new trees to be planted in the park along with dozens of new shrubs and native grasses.

•The plan calls for revitalization and repositioning of the picnic area behind the American Legion Hall, not removal of it.

•The proposal would result in the same number of fields for baseball and soccer as is indicated in the original 2005 plan. There is not one less field for each of those sports. 

•The Conservancy letter detailing conditions for the Flint Park proposal to qualify for Legacy funding from Westchester County was misleading. The Village’s “quid pro quo” had not yet been released.

•While the Westchester County Legacy program requires the field be open to all Westchester residents, all similar projects that have been successfully completed to date have met this requirement simply by having the field be used like all others in the community for travel teams. So when neighboring community teams come to play at our home games, we satisfy the requirement.

•The budget for this project is estimated at $1.6 million, which will be funded mostly by the Legacy program. This should not change the budget for the balance of the improvements previously planned that still require funding.

•The plans call for bleachers, not stadium-style seating.

•The artificial turf field would be utilized by lacrosse and field hockey teams, in addition to soccer and baseball.

•The Mamaroneck High School proposals include resurfacing existing fields, not necessarily creating new ones. County Legacy funds are not available to schools; they are only available to municipalities.

•While the Village of Mamaroneck has mentioned the possibility of submitting for Legacy Funds in the future, the new Board has no immediate plans for where a field or resurfacing project would be or a timeframe for when such a proposal will be created.

•Fencing around the current tennis courts is 10 feet high and is not landscaped.  The new field would have a fence approximately four feet high and would be landscaped to compliment the park environment.

•Significant new plantings are planned to compensate for the loss of trees, many of which are in poor condition.

•Lighting is not included in the current plan or budget.

•The two overlapping baseball fields previously proposed in the 2005 plan on the South side of the park road have been relocated to allow for two games to be played simultaneously.

The Village of Larchmont, in response to public feedback, has scheduled two additional working sessions on January 20th and January 24th. Representatives from local community groups, including Fields for Kids and the Flint Park Conservancy, have been invited to participate.

“We hope these sessions will bring consensus, resolve the issues, and get everyone on the same page,” said Hanley. “We support the efforts of the Village of Larchmont in creating this new turf field and are hopeful that they will move forward with their application to the County for Legacy Funds.

Larchmont Mamaroneck Fields for Kids is a community-based organization whose mission is to advocate for the adequate number of safe and up-to-date playing fields for students participating in school-related and community-run sports programs in our area.

 

Fields for Kids

Press Contact: Blythe Hamer     cell 914-643-0890   blythehamer@hotmail.com