Scott Radley: Some good field news at last for Bernie Custis Secondary athletes
If you're an outdoor athlete at Bernie Custis Secondary School where practising has been a huge challenge because of the lack of a home field, some good news seems to have arrived at last.
The number of hours the city has allotted for use of Tim Hortons Field between March and June alone has increased fivefold from any previous entire school year.
We have approximately 270 hours booked for the Bernie Custis School," says Rom D'Angelo, the city's director of energy, fleet and facilities management.
The previous high was 54. So this jump - which follows a Spectator story about a shortage of public access to the stadium that was built with public access as a promise - is a positive sign that the city is doing something to give these student-athletes a fair shot. Doesn't even matter that the hours are early in the morning and after school. It's a vast improvement.
D'Angelo says a big part of the shortage prior to now is that COVID hit shortly after the school opened in 2019, so requests for time weren't there. With the pandemic waning, it's been able to accommodate the greater demand.
Whatever the reason, it's good. Nowhere near perfect - that would require a field for which there's no room - but it's a good step.
That said, it's unclear how helpful the next possible move to improve things will be.
The only thing resembling a field on the school property is a rolling meadow of a lawn out front. Over the past few years, some teams have tried to use it for practice. Trouble is, the spot contains a number of berms that make playing any kind of sport difficult.
On Monday, Cynthia Graham, the city's acting director of environmental services, told the city-school board liaison committee that razing the humps would cost between $40,000 and $60,000 and wouldn't be difficult.
The only real complication is that while this is a school board issue, the mounds lie on city land. To that, Mayor Fred Eisenberger says sharing the cost would be a reasonable compromise since losing the little hills would be better for the kids.
Certainly it's easier to manoeuvre on a flat surface than on a berm," he says.
Indeed. Though it should be pointed out that flat doesn't mean level. The ground has to have a slope to help with drainage. So there would be a tilt.
Even so, some kind of grade is better than completely unusable for teams that don't have endless options right now. This would at least give them something.
Though even that comes with caveats. It might work for a gym class, says HWDSB senior facilities manager Dave Anderson. But not for a team to use for any kind of practice.
It's not a field for sport use."
Probably not more than one gym class at a time, either. It's not a big space. So access to a field during school hours is going to remain an issue.
Tim Hortons Field was supposed to help fill the gap, but until now, getting access to that turf has been difficult.
A promised new field at Brightside Park (the site of the old Dominion Glass Factory) - about a 15-minute walk from the school - was also supposed to offer plenty of field time either for students or by having Forge FC hold some practices there, freeing up Tim Hortons Field for school use.
Trouble is, environmental assessments haven't even been completed at the proposed new park and completion is still years away. It's not going to be of assistance for some time.
What should be helpful are those additional field hours now locked in at Tim Hortons Field. Considering Forge FC doesn't start using the field until 8:30 most mornings and the Ticats are done by 3 most afternoons, the 7 to 8:30 morning slots and 3:15 to 6 afternoon slots the school has been given every weekday should even be sustainable into next year and the future.
Meaning things seem to be getting a bit better. But resolved completely?
No. And not any time soon.
Scott Radley is a Hamilton-based columnist at The Spectator. Reach him via email: sradley@thespec.com