MOORPARK : Board to Reconsider Youth Group Fees

The Moorpark school board has agreed to reconsider a recent change in district policy that charges youth groups that use district athletic fields and facilities.

In an attempt to recoup money the district spends on field maintenance, the school board in April approved revisions to the fee policy without anticipating a flood of protest from local groups claiming they were being priced out of using the fields.

Representatives from several Moorpark youth sports leagues attended the board’s meeting Tuesday and blasted the new fees which, in some cases, amounted to thousands of dollars for a single season’s use.

“I just feel . . . you’re only hurting the kids,” said Mike Drummond, a member of the board of directors of Moorpark Little League and the Moorpark Packers youth football team.

“If we start making it about dollars and cents, we have lost it in this community,” said Gene Hatton, president of the Moorpark Girls’ Softball League.

“We cannot afford, today, to turn the kids off, to close the school gates and tell the kids, ‘You can’t be on these facilities.’ ”

Board member Tom Baldwin, who suggested that the board take another look at the fees, said he did not realize how the changes would affect the local sports groups.

Baldwin says he supports a return to the former policy.

“If we can find our way back to where we were last year, I think everybody would be happy,” he said.

The board agreed to send the matter back to Supt. Tom Duffy for review, with the instructions that he return next month after drafting a revised policy and meeting with individual groups to make sure it was acceptable.