Mt. Lebanon Sports Advisory Board Meeting Agenda
October 3, 2013, 8:00 p.m.
Municipal Building Room 104C
1. Call to Order and Roll Call
2. Citizen Comments
3. Approval of the June 6, 2013 Meeting Minutes
4. Asset/Inventory Review from Each Organization (Worksheets should be submitted prior to the meeting)
5. Field Sign Sponsorship Program
6. Brafferton Field Project Update
7. Cedar Boulevard Parking Lot Project
8. Turf Project
9. Inventory Field/Athletic Facilities and Utilization
10. Forum for Unrepresented Groups
11. Other Short and Long Term Goals
12. Announcements
a. Historic Preservation Board National Register Designation Meeting- December 5 at 6:00 p.m. Room C, Municipal Building
13. Adjournment
I don't understand how we can have a group of people wanting a Pay As You Throw program which encourages us to recycle, and then turn around and ask for artificial turf. At least Brumfield is consistent. He is against the PAYT idea. For that, I have to give him credit.
Anyone up to attending tomorrow's meeting?
No.
ReplyDeleteFranklin passed me on Cochran Road the other day. It was the first time I saw him in person. We're fighting a losing battle with this one. It's a done deal.
John David Kendrick
You can't have it both ways. Go Green or Go Fake Green.
ReplyDeleteElaine
Really, Brumfield is committed to vote no on PAYT?
ReplyDeleteSo who exactly is pushing for PAYT?
Kristen and Kelly brought it to the commission. Both had lived in CA where it worked. Dave lived in an area where it didn't work.
ReplyDeleteThere are people pushing PAYT at the same time as wanting artificial turf.
Elaine
If I wanted to live in California, I'd move to California.
ReplyDeleteCalifornia is suddenly a model of sensible regulations? Hahaha..and China is a great shining example of human rights...I dont know where I would even begin in tearing down an idea as stupid as what's being proposed.
ReplyDeleteAre you talking about the turf project that is on the Turf Board Agenda?
ReplyDeleteElaine
California is in shambles. No jobs, expensive housing (expensive everything for that matter), terrible schools, corrupted government and its crime ridden. If I wanted to live in California I would move there. It's a terrible place to live for so many reasons.
ReplyDelete10:11 PM, this post is about turf in a community that thinks we should go green. Can you go to the meeting tomorrow?
ReplyDeleteElaine
This is Dave B.'s domain and since his kids are into lacrosse and swimming just face facts and accept that those two sports OVERRIDE all else. If up to him he'd turf a field over purchasing a fire truck or ambulance. It's what IS important to him! Not everyone else... He doesn't see that his own neighbors laugh at how unprofessional he is. Other weekend at their little fire pit deal he could be heard trashing those that disagreed with him. We stopped while on our nightly walk and listened and LAUGHED at his stupidity. Even thought my mild manner wife was ready to run down and slap some sense into him. Bet she would win...
ReplyDelete2:00 AM, "Even thought my mild manner wife was ready to run down and slap some sense into him." is hilarious!
ReplyDeleteElaine
This has nothing to do with turf.
ReplyDeletePAYT is not about being green or teaching us how to recycle.
It is solely about adding yet another TAX.
I don't understand how turfing a field should be the municipalities responsibility? I understand Mt. Lebanon owns the field, but if the Sports Advisory Board wants to turf the field, shouldn't it be the responsibility of the SA Board to raise the funds to do so? The municipality should only worry about areas that affect all citizens and not just a very specific group of individuals. The only thing the SA board should be doing is asking the municipality permission to raise funds to do the turffing.
ReplyDeleteSort of 11:38.
ReplyDeleteThey are not strictly speaking - adding a tax.
They are replacing a service now paid for by taxes for a similar one paid for thru a fee.
Doing so will allow for some shady sleight of hand that will make those now unused tax dollars for turf.
The (0-4) Pittsburgh Steelers, winners of six Super Bowls, the most of any franchise, play at Heinz Field,Pennsylvania taxpayers contributed about $260 million to help build Heinz Field—and to retire debt from the Steelers’ previous stadium. Most game-day revenues (including television fees) go to the Rooney family, the majority owner of the team. The team’s owners also kept the $75 million that Heinz paid to name the facility.
ReplyDeleteThe National Football League is about two things: producing high-quality sports entertainment, which it does very well, and exploiting taxpayers, which it also does very well. Goodell should know—his pay, about $30 million in 2011, flows from an organization that does not pay corporate taxes.
That’s right—extremely profitable and one of the most subsidized organizations in American history, the NFL also enjoys tax-exempt status. On paper, it is the Nonprofit Football League.
Roger Goodell has become the sort of person his father once opposed—an insider who profits from his position while average people pay.
Baseball, basketball, ice hockey, and other sports also benefit from this same process. But the fact that others take advantage of the public too is no justification. The NFL’s sweetheart deal is by far the most valuable: This year, CBS, DirecTV, ESPN, Fox, NBC, and Verizon will pay the NFL about $4 billion for the rights to broadcast its games. Next year, that figure will rise to more than $6 billion. Because football is so popular, its broadcast fees would be high no matter how the financial details were structured. The fact that game images created in places built and operated at public expense can be privatized by the NFL inflates the amounts kept by NFL owners, executives, coaches, and players, while driving up the cable fees paid by people who may not even care to watch the games.
In too many areas of contemporary life, public subsidies are converted to private profit. Sometimes, such as with the bailout of General Motors, once the subsidies end, society is better off; sometimes, as with the bailout of AIG, subsidies are repaid. Public handouts for modern professional football never end and are never repaid. In return, the NFL creates nothing of social value—while setting bad examples, despite its protests to the contrary, regarding concussions, painkiller misuse, weight gain, and cheating, among other issues. The No. 1 sport in a nation with a childhood-obesity epidemic celebrates weight gain; that’s bad enough. Worse, the sport setting the bad example is subsidized up one side and down the other.
Until public attitudes change, those at the top of the pro-football pyramid will keep getting away with whatever they can. This is troubling not just because ordinary people are taxed so a small number of NFL owners and officers can live as modern feudal lords and ladies. It is troubling because athletics are supposed to set an example—and the example being set by the NFL is one of selfishness.
Football is the king of sports. Should the favorite sport of the greatest nation really be one whose economic structure is based on inequality and greed?
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/10/how-the-nfl-fleeces-taxpayers/309448/
We all know who runs the garbage industry. Is there anyone DB and friends won't snuggle with?
ReplyDelete"5:23 PM" For the last time, DB isn't snuggling with the garbage industry. Where do you come up with this trash?
ReplyDeleteElaine
Don't you wonder Elaine.
ReplyDeleteIt has been stated numerous times here that Brumfield opposes PAYT.
I'm surprised by that and the final test will be how he votes on it, but how 5:23 can accuse him of snuggling with the garbage industry means they have evidence conflicting with yours or they are just plain angry and/or nuts.
Which is why your readers need to think and evaluate comments for themselves always.
Elaine, usually forms opinions on subjects of local interest that align with mine. Occasionally they don't and I'd imagine often she finds herself 180 degrees out of slightly with my positions.
That's what makes her blog so great.
And she does it free and despite great abuse.
4:57's comment says "Pennsylvania taxpayers contributed about $260 million to help build Heinz Field—and to retire debt from the Steelers’ previous stadium. Most game-day revenues (including television fees) go to the Rooney family, the majority owner of the team. The team’s owners also kept the $75 million that Heinz paid to name the facility."
ReplyDeleteSo the Rooney family walked away from the debt on two stadiums instead of just one and kept the extra money for themselves. Maybe we should call them the Pittsburg Stealers.
Where are the environmentalists at? (don't we have an environmental board?) You'd think they'd be up in arms with the destruction of grass which could harbor some ecosystem of some type.
ReplyDeleteWhere are the people concerned about water run off? You're replacing grass, which uses water to thrive and replacing it with non-permeable surface (or if it's permeable, it's just going to drain off where it will flood a basement somewhere).
Why is it Mt Lebanon seems to be like the Bizzaro world?
Hi Jack,
ReplyDeleteThe turf at Mellon will have a crown (hump) a t mid-field that will drain into the baseball field. Drains have been placed in the baseball field to take the water away. It is a great place for a baseball player to slipl on a drain, while running backwards, perhaps getting a serious concussion with the fall.
Personal legal liability attaches to public officials who deliberately create unsafe conditions and I will be happy to supply a parent(s) with the legal cases that apply if there is an injured child.
Personal legal liability can be very expensive and both commissioners and school board members should avoid lawsuits and high legal expenses - even if you lose the case.
P. S. to Jack, the New York Times, Goldman Sacks book of the year will be announced October 27. Steve Coll,author of, "Ghost Wars" is a judge this year.
Opps! Financial Times/Goldman Sachs book of the year. not New York Times. Sorry.
ReplyDeleteI GOT IT!!! Here's the answer... Turf will raise the temp on the fields by 200% causing Global Warming. Grass cools! It's for Mother Earth!
ReplyDeleteSorry but has ANYONE brought up the issues of not only increased soft-tissue injuries from turf vs grass but the much higher rate of various head injuries. Will Dave B. hire UPMC to track these too and what will that cost? There's a reason why most professional football and soccer teams practice on grass!
ReplyDeleteYou have three commissioners offering to turf a field, leaving the Turf Board to decide which field. John Bendel, Dave Brumfield and Kristen Linfante want to spend unnassigned funds on turf. Kelly Fraasch only wants eco friendly turf. As John Bendel said at the SAB, they only need three votes.
ReplyDeleteElaine
http://www.momsteam.com/health-safety/turf-wars-pros-and-cons-of-artificial-turf
ReplyDeletePART 1
"The following is a summary of the pros and cons of artificial turf:
Pros
Lower maintenance costs. While the initial cost (around $600K) is high, proponents claim that upkeep is much less expensive, dropping by some estimates from $35K to $5K per year. Some question whether artificial turf is as financially friendly as touted, citing the need for repairs, vacuuming, refilling and even watering, suggesting that the fields may not last as long as advertised, and raising the thorny problem of disposal.
Pesticide-free. Unlike natural grass, artificial turf doesn't require treatment with pesticides and fertilizers (note, however, the success some towns are having with organic grass fields).
Increased playability. Artificial turf fields are much more durable than grass; because playability is much higher, they allow broader access; can be played on all the time; in time of scarce fields, they give youth sports organizations practice space they might otherwise not have; the problem of spring and fall rains which result in cancellation of numerous games and practices slated for grass fields is eliminated; one match on a muddy field can ruin the field for the rest of the season.
Fewer injuries: Durability and an even playing surface mean fewer injuries and unlike grass that gets torn up by rough play and eventually turns into vast patches of slippery mud (twisted ankles from potholes, uneven playing surface, slips in the mud).
Saves water. An average grass playing field uses about 50,000 gallons of water per week during the growing season."
PART 2
ReplyDeleteCons
Heat hazard. The heat-absorbing properties of an artificial field make it too hot to play on in extremely warm weather. On a 98-degree day, the temperature on the turf could rise to more than 120 degrees. A Brigham Young University study found that the surface temperature of synthetic turf at its football practice field was 37 degrees higher than the air temperature. Proponents point out that use of the fields can be managed to ensure that athletes aren't playing at the hottest times of the day and are adequately hydrated; as a result, they argue, the higher temperature is more of a comfort issue than safety issue.
Lead. Excessive exposure to lead has been linked to severe mental retardation, stunted growth and death. As Don Mays, senior director of product safety at the Consumer's Union, publisher of Consumer Reports, says, "There is no safe level of lead; let's be clear on that." The American Academy of Pediatrics agrees, saying that there is no safe level of lead exposure and suggesting that levels in soil be no higher than trace amounts (40 parts per million). Older turf fields made from nylon or nylon/polyethylene blend fibers may contain levels of lead that pose a potential public health concern. Tests of artificial turf fields made with only polyethylene fibers showed that these fields contained very low levels of lead.
Field Turf, the largest artificial turf manufacturer in North America, sells a lead-free artificial turf, but only if the communityasks for the custom-made field. The fields that most communities purchase use lead to brighten the field's colors and for a sport team logo.
Says Jackie Lombardo, a member of the Sierra Club National Toxics Committee, "We know older turf products contain toxic chemicals associated with asthma, learning disabilities, and cancer. Saying they are safe because they don't contain lead is like saying cigarettes are safe because they don't contain lead. There are so many chemicals in this synthetic grass and we don't know what the effects are going to be not only on children's health, but also what the effects are on the ground water as well."
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has consistently recommended "the elimination of all non-essential uses of lead" because of the potential health hazards they pose and has long considered lead dust one of the biggest known health hazards to children; it notes that the combination of age, weathering, exposure to sunlight and wear and tear can cause dust containing lead to be released from older or well-used fields.
PART 3
ReplyDeleteZinc hazard: A Connecticut-based environmental advocacy group, Environment and Human Health Inc. (EHHI), has been sounding warnings about artificial turf fields for a number of years and found support for its contentions in a preliminary study in 2007 by researchers at the Connecticut agricultural experiment station which examined the contents of "crumb rubber" and concluded that several potentially dangerous chemical compounds could escape into the air or leach into water under certain conditions. Levels of zinc found leaching into water were inordinately high. A study by University of North Carolina found a possible link between continued exposure to zinc and cardiovascular damage.
Other harmful chemicals: according to EHHI, shredded rubber could contain other toxic metals like arsenic, cadmium, chromium, and selenium.
Toxic run-off. When an artificial field drains after a heavy rain, the run-off (which may contain lead and infill material) could leach into and contaminate a community's ground and drinking water.
Increased MRSA risk. Open skin lesions (so-called "turf burns") put athletes at increased risk of MRSA. Studies have shown that athletes who use synthetic turf are seven times more likely to receive turf burns than those who play on natural grass. These open lesions are often the source of contracting and vehicle for spreading dangerous infections. In fact, a 2003 study of MRSA infections among St. Louis Rams football players found that all eight MRSA infections began at turf burn sites.
Bacterial breeding ground. Medical experts have found that staphylococci and other bacteria can survive on polyethylene plastic, the compound used to make synthetic turf blades, for more than 90 days. Blood, sweat, skin cells and other materials can remain on the synthetic turf because the fields are not washed or cleaned.
Adverse affect on asthmatics. Breathing in dust of ground-up tires could exacerbate breathing problems for asthmatics.
Once artificial, always artificial. Once a community goes with artificial turf, it has no choice but to install another artificial turf field when the first one needs to be replaced because once plastic replaces natural grass, it kills any living organism in the subsoil making it impossible without years of soil remediation to grow anything on that surface."
Funny, moms that are pushing PAYT citing recycling and saving the environment will turn around and support artificiall turf
Thankfully, turf is not on the agenda for Tuesday. That was the only hot topic remaining that could pack a room. Gone are the discussions of grass vs. turf. It is, "Which field do you want turf, Boys?"
ReplyDeleteElaine
Hope you're being toungue-cheek when you say thankfully its not on the agenda!
ReplyDeleteDoes this indicate there are backdoor deals being made on which field gets turfed and who pays for it?
After reading the 3 part Mom's Team pros and cons I'm left wondering... where's the Environment Sustainability Board on this?
Are all they good for is suggesting erecting No Idling Signs?
Then there is the so unbiased and informative official community magazine.
Its reports on organic farmers etc., but the health concerns of a possible million dollar turf project... mum, deaf and blind.