In the Press and an Email Comment.

As seen in Grand Terrace City News : June 8th.2006

Does the City Really Support Youth Sports?

Have you stopped to think if our city leaders really support the youth sports groups in town? If you are like me, this thought crosses your mind every now and then and this past weekend at Grand Terrace Days got me thinking again. There are three youth sports organizations in Grand Terace that provide services that the city does not provide, and that is a safe and supervised environment for the youth of Grand Terrace to learn valuable life lessons.

But this past weekend you saw the city forget to reserve a space at Rollins Park for Little League until Friday night and then they also allowed another youth soccer group that has no ties to the community have a boo;th that served as a fund raiser for them. This soccer group's only tie to the community is that some of the players reside in Grand Terrace.

The city has a history of showing support for the kids when it makes them look the best in the community's eyes. Take for example a few years back when the remodel of Rollins Park was taking place. The city refused to sign a grant paper work that soccer had presented that wouldl have given the project another $50,000 to $75,000 to help fund the additional game lights. This was not signed because the city did not like the fact that it had to grant soccer rights to use for a specific amount of time. This grant money in turn went to Colton Soccer for their projects. You can also look at the lack of proper lighting at Pico Park for the youth basketball to practice under, or the same of the restrooms at Pico Park. These youth sports groups provide a tremendous service to the community and give bacxk to it as well through time and money spent supporting them. The city needs to take a hard look at this and realize that between the 3 organizations there are a large number of voters, who if joined together, could make some serious noise in the city,.

The city needs to take a long hard look at the effort and time that all the members of Soccer, Little League and Basketball put into the youth of this community and start showing a bit more support and work closer with the groups and not against them. The city needs these groups more every year since it does not have a budget to provide an outlet like this to the children of this community.

Chris Evans, Grand Terrace

I would like to add, and why does the City Mayor, Maryetta Ferre, Councilwoman, Bea Cortez, and Assistant City Manager,Steve Berry, take every chance they can to grandstand their success of these programs. These people do not have a successful program history of anything. It is the hardworking mothers and fathers of children who care.

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