City Hosts Workshop Today on Sports Field Upkeep

The city is coming up with a game plan for how to care for its sports fields as demand and use increase.

A city-hired consultant will deliver a presentation on the subject at a meeting from 4 to 6 p.m. today at the Dougherty Station Community Center's , 17011 Bollinger Canyon Road.

In November, the city spent $6,255 for  consulting firm PRZ International Sports Turf to study the most affordable and efficient ways to care for city owned sports fields. Larry Musser, president of the consulting company, will deliver the presentation today. Anyone is welcome to attend.

The presentation, which costs the city another $1,500, will go over "management of scheduled use and unscheduled periods, implementing effective and cost saving strategies, preserving the quality of the fields and protecting these valuable community assets for years to come," according to the city.

Some of the report's recommendations include buying new equipment to make employees more productive, re-seeding some fields, improving irrigation water quality and increase maintenance levels.

The report says the popularity of soccer and year-round use of public sports fields makes it harder for cities like San Ramon to keep turf healthy and sustainable:

You have experienced what every major city and school district in the United States has experienced in the past 12 to 15 years-the explosion of soccer. Nationally, soccer play has grown 60 percent faster than the population in most areas. It is the reason that every baseball field outfield is a soccer field and why every park with open spaces has become a soccer field and none of your fields were ever designed to take this kind of wear.

There is a direct correlation between sports field wear and sports field maintenance. During this same 12 to 15 years that usage has grown this much, most fields were still being maintained at the level they were when fields were dedicated fields (one sport and when that season was over, the field was rested or allowed to mend). In many cases during this same period budgets and maintenance crews have been reduced while the acreage of turf has grown.

For more information, call the city's Maintenance Operations Division Manager Jeff Gault at 973-2800 or email him at jgault@sanramon.ca.gov. Click on the pdf attached to this article to view the entire document.