Parks and Rec Board holds meeting to discuss field use, community questions

The Vestavia Hills Parks and Recreation Board held a specially-called meeting Wednesday to respond to concerns and questions from the community.

“It is the goal of the park board tonight to provide information and clarity to the issues that have been raised," board president Anne Smyth said.

Discussion centered around emails sent by coaches Jared Smith and Kevin Ulch regarding questions about field use, resident vs. non-resident participation, Let's Play Vestavia, and the possible new non-profit organizational structure for sports programs. 

Clarification of information

After the meeting was called to order and the agenda of the meeting was discussed by Smyth, board member Tommy Dazzio went through a series of PowerPoint slides to explain the issues raised in Smith's email.

The email by Smith, a third-grade youth football assistant coach and member of the youth baseball board, was sent on Aug. 8, and posts about the email appeared on social media in the days following.

The email included several claims that Dazzio and Smyth said the board wanted to address. The full presentation deck from the meeting can be found here.

“It was impossible to correct that email with another email,” Dazzio said.

Dazzio began by clarifying that the board recognizes all sports, and that many of the issues at hand apply to all sports, but that the questions in the email were primarily focused on soccer, and the information in the presentation reflected that.

First, Dazzio addressed Smith's stated concerns in the email that the Vestavia Hills Soccer Club was operating as a for-profit business, allegedly evidenced by the soccer club hiring paid coaches and an executive director. 

Dazzio said there is not a difference between a youth recreation "association" and a "club," and that groups organize and name themselves based on parent and sport-board preference. He also said that it is false that these organizations are a "business," because any of the funds raised go toward operating costs and equipment. Even if the associations or clubs elect to hire a paid coach, which Dazzio said they are free to do, the leagues do not turn a profit and are not considered a business entity.

“Our bylaws set for the purpose of all the youth sports programs,” he said. “Each individual sport can organize its participants and its programs the best way it sees fit as long as they comply with the purposes of the sports programs.”

Dazzio then moved on to clarify the rules regarding resident vs. non-resident participation in recreational sports. In most youth sports, there is no residency requirement, and most of the city's youth teams are between 70 and 80 percent Vestavia Hills residents. This is in contrast to the 50 percent non-resident figure that Smith's email stated.

The only exception, Dazzio said, are high school age or 15-18 year old teams. Per AHSAA rules, only 50 percent of players in that age group are allowed to be residents, meaning that there are larger numbers of non-resident players on those teams. While this may be confusing to some citizens, Dazzio said, he said he thinks it is necessary to provide the off-season competitive teams, such as soccer, for high school students looking to stay in shape in order to compete for potential collegiate scholarships.

Dazzio and Smyth also addressed concerns that certain sports were "pushing out" others and getting preferential treatment with regard to rectangle field use.

He said the only field-use issue that has come up so far this year is the result of rain-outs and the construction going on in Cahaba Heights and Wald Park.

"As we sit here today, we do not have a capacity issue," Dazzio said.

This was a response to the claim that youth football teams were being pushed to diamond fields, but Dazzio said that all VHYF boards were contacted, and none requested additional space. If the football program does decide to grow in the future, Dazzio said, the city would make arrangements based on need.

Discussion of the issues

Smith took to the podium to explain his email and said he wanted to address any confusion as to why he sent it.

He said he was not interested in influencing the city council race, as some have indicated because Smith is City Council Place-1 candidate Rusty Weaver's assistant coach, and because he has expressed support for Weaver's campaign.

He sent the email, he said, to a group of personal contacts in order to raise questions and issues he thinks have been ignored by the board.

"My question is this: Is it right, is it legal, is it ethical for the City/Parks and Rec Board to grant exclusive access or subsidize a business, an entity, with city-owned and maintained fields in return for donations to the recreation fund?" Smith said.

The question referred to the soccer club as well as Let's Play Vestavia, an organization that was formed to promote Sicard Hollow Athletic Complex and provide a regular funding source for the Parks and Recreation Foundation. Let's Play Vestavia uses city fields for its various programs.

City Council Place-4 candidate and local attorney Bob Elliot addressed the meeting and explained that he gave his time to help put the program together, and in his legal opinion, not only is the use of the fields legal, but it provides much needed support for park facilities.

The funding, he said, allows the city's resources to go farther in making recreation facilities better and more useful for residents, which he said is the main argument for the morality of the agreement.

Elliot further argued that the partnership is sound because of the requirements of Let's Play Vestavia to pay for any damage or other incurred costs because of its activity in public areas.

He also said that the agreement dictates that the city's recreational programs take priority over Let's Play Vestavia's.

"It's not a moral obligation, it's an enforceable report," he said. "From my perspective, the answer to your [Smith's] question, the 'yes' or 'no' question, is 'yes'."

Non-profit questions

The meeting also discussed Kevin Ulch's social media posts and emails regarding a proposed "universal" non-profit filing for all of the city's sports boards.

The proposal would create a separate 501(C)-3 board, which would organize all sports board financials and prepare the necessary tax returns and documents. This way, the boards could use one 501(C)-3 number, rather than having to go through the expensive process of creating one for each board.

Meyers said the proposal came about because the City can no longer allow the boards to use its tax-ID number, and because each account is federally required to have a separate EIN.

The restructuring, Meyers said, would also allow for more oversight of accounting practices, and prevent any reporting problems like those that came up during the 2015-2016 fiscal year.

Progress on the project has stalled, because Meyers said the park board is waiting on a legal opinion as to whether or not the new 501(C)-3 board is a legal option, and if that board would cause the sports boards to be subject to the Alabama Open Meetings acts and other restrictions placed on public voting bodies.