Residents cool on lighting school sports fields

The rezone of historic Hedlin’s Ballfield and conversion of the nearly two-acre site along Maple Avenue into a subdivision and park space has been headline news here for more than a year.

The land has been bought and sold, but relocating local youth sports in 2022 after Landed Gentry Homes constructs 10 residences on the baseball diamond is not resolved.

The prospect of the Town, La Conner Schools and perhaps Swinomish Tribal Community applying for grant funding to light additional school athletic fields to help meet district and youth recreational needs didn’t reach first base during the April 13 Council Zoom session.

Residents of Tillinghast Lane next to the southeast portion of the La Conner Schools campus logged on to express concerns about the potential impact added lighting and sports-related traffic would have on their neighborhood.

Troy and Le Ann Bushey and Rick Dole, the latter of whom is a member of the town planning commission, cited those reservations and asked that if a lighting project is undertaken that it be located on campus fields more distant from neighboring homes.

The Council received those concerns without comment, but there was no doubt they were heard. Campus area residents complained of noise in 2018 and 2019 when a Seattle-based competition drum and bugle corps set up camp at the school and played loud music till 10 p.m. for a couple weeks each June in preparation for a national tour.

“I think people living in the area are understandably a little sensitive to that sort of thing,” Mayor Ramon Hayes said Wednesday, the day after the Council meeting.

Another ballfield sidebar focuses on what shape the future public park –at 24,000 square feet it represents 30 per cent of the ballfield property – will take.

Town Administrator Scott Thomas told Council members that the La Conner Parks Commission is committed to seeking public input, most likely involving a survey, for direction on what the park area will entail.

At its April 14 meeting, Thomas told the Weekly News the next day, the parks panel discussed the ad hoc committee that will explore the most effective ways to gather public input regarding the park..

“We’ve had several people interested in being part of the process,” Thomas said, “and we anticipate additional people coming in as well.”

Much of the briskly-paced 40-minute meeting was devoted to an application for Community Development Block Grant planning funding for utilizing La Conner’s formerly bustling south end industrial zone.

“The grant would be no more than $30,000 – that would be at the upper level – but if awarded it would be enough for us to conduct a study for what could be done there,” Thomas said.

The study could address plans for the former Moore-Clark plant and the feasibility of extending First Street south to Caledonia.

“This grant is one to two months out,” said Thomas. “At this point we’re trying to put together the application. We’ll shoot for whatever we can get.”

Council also:

• Approved an $18,000 three-year agreement with the La Conner Arts Foundation to manage November’s Art’s Alive! Festival, including the opening night gala, receptions and art sales.

• Extended 2020’s on call service agreements with both C. Johnson Construction and SRV Construction, from Oak Harbor, for emergency services. “The reason we want to have two on board,” Public Works Director Brian Lease explained, “is in case one is not available when needed.” C. Johnson Construction re-armored the shoreline at Conner Waterfront Park last year and was able to provide emergency work at nearby Pioneer Park following windstorm damage there. “They were extremely helpful in emergency situations,” said Lease.

• Heard Lease’s report that new alarm and lock systems have been installed at Town facilities, including his department’s offices and shop, which have suffered two major break-ins and thefts since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic last year.

• Heard Hayes again suggest forming a citizen’s patrol, administered by the Skagit County Sheriff’s Office. “I feel it’s an idea whose time has come,” Hayes said. “(Law enforcement) resources are tight. I would personally advocate for it.” The citizen’s patrol, he said, could serve as “an extra set of eyes and ears” when sheriff’s deputies are on call out of town.