HUNTINGTON BEACH : Coalition to Create Sports Park Urged

Councilman Don MacAllister said he will propose tonight that the city form a coalition with area youth groups to develop a park with baseball, football, softball and soccer fields.

The closing of some schools and the development of other open areas have created a dire need for such a park, said MacAllister, a member of the Huntington Beach YMCA board of directors. The Ocean View Little League, for example, will lose its playing fields of many years when the former site of Rancho View School is developed next year by its new owner.

The councilman and youth group leaders have several sites in mind for a new facility. The main site they are targeting is an undeveloped, 20-acre area of Huntington Central Park west of where Talbert Avenue dead ends at Golden West Avenue.

“That spot has a natural amphitheater type of setting, which would be ideal for this kind of complex,” MacAllister said.

Another potential area is the field across the street, at the former site of the Ocean View Mushroom Farm. The farm site was cleared to make way for the relocation of a mobile home park. However, a recent study revealed high levels of methane near the location, which may make the old farmland uninhabitable.

But it may be usable for a sports complex, an idea other council members say should be studied.

Debbie Cook, spokeswoman for a citizens group dedicated to preserving the city’s parklands, said that she is not opposed to locating the facility in Central Park but that voters should make the final decision.

MacAllister said he plans to discuss various aspects of the complex with council members and then request that staff officials devise a detailed proposal. He said he favors a financial partnership with the youth groups, whereby the city would offer the land and help develop the facility, in exchange for the groups’ maintaining it and paying any remaining costs.