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Politics & Government

Finance Committee Says No to New Lights for Ball Field at Frame Park

Proposed lights voted down, despite support from civic and community groups.

Three votes and it’s out.

A proposal for new baseball lights in Frame Park was voted down by the Waukesha Finance Committee Tuesday night.

In a 3-2 vote, the committee denied the recommendation from the Parks, Recreation and Forestry Board for a baseball field lighting project with an estimated total cost of $205,000, despite the pledged-financial support of a variety of civic and community groups, including the School District of Waukesha, Carroll University, Catholic Memorial High School and the Waukesha & Pewaukee Convention and Visitors Bureau.

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If the proposal had gone through, the organizations had promised to pay a total of $27,000 for the new lights, bringing the cost down to an estimated $105,000 after $73,000 in impact fees.

In voting against the proposal, committee chairman Joe Pieper said that it was more of matter of money allocation than anything else.

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“For me, it comes down to the highest and best use of limited funds,"he said.

"I certainly understand the importance of baseball and recreation but in my humble opinion when we’re facing more pressing areas of need within the city, it’s very difficult to move ahead and support this,” Pieper said.

In recommending the project, Ron Grall, director of Parks, Recreation and Forestry, said that demand for baseball fields in the city has increased over the past years and the field at Frame Park has limited usage at night because of the outdated and failing lighting system which prevents teams from playing night games or double-headers. High school teams haven’t played on the field for two years because of problems with the lights.

According to Grall, some benefits of the new lights, in addition to teams being able to play at night without delays, would have included:

  • the ability to remotely program the lights, as opposed to now, when staff has to be at the game to  reset the lights when they break-down;
  • an estimated cost saving over 25 years of $30,000 in utility charges because the new lights would be more efficient; and
  • less light-spill, something the neighbors were concerned about, and overall, more aesthetically-pleasing lights.

“We see a lot of advantages,” Grall said. He also said that the proposed vendor offers a maintenance guarantee for 25 years at 100 percent coverage, including lamps replacement.

Alderman Paul Ybarra voted in favor of the lights, noting that the last time the lights were upgraded was 27 years ago.  

“It’s about time to get this done. It’ll last us another 25 years. It has gone through the internal process already,” Ybarra said.

Those who also spoke in favor of the new lights included Dan Domach, athletic director from Waukesha South High School, and Tammy Tritz, executive director of the Waukesha and Pewaukee Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Tritz said that the convention was interested in supporting the project because sports tourism is one of fastest growing tourism markets.

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