LOS ALAMITOS : City OKs $15,000 for Field Lighting

The City Council has approved a $15,000 expenditure to improve lighting at the Oak Middle School athletics field.

The American Youth Soccer Organization, which manages a soccer program for about 1,400 children here and in nearby communities, has pledged another $10,000 for the improvements that will allow more soccer teams to practice at night.

Dream Engineering Inc., an Apple Valley, Calif., company that specializes in sports lighting, will design the improvements, according to Mark A. Wager, director of the city’s Recreation and Community Services.

The project will then go out to bid in November. Following Monday’s unanimous vote for the appropriation, it will take 90 days to complete the project, Wagner said.

The 24-acre site, which has not been used as a school since 1986, has the only lighted field in the city that is suitable for soccer, Wagner said. But the last lighting improvements were made 12 years ago, he said.

In addition to a soccer field, the facility has a running track, a softball field and lighted outdoor basketball courts, Wagner said.

He said teams and individuals pay the city an hourly rate of $7.50 to use the soccer and softball fields and $2 for the basketball courts.

Lighting would be improved by installing an 80-foot pole with nine 1,500-watt bulbs on the north side of the soccer practice field. The main soccer field also will get more light because existing bulbs will be replaced with 1,500-watt bulbs.

“We’ll provide more lighted areas for the teams to use,” Wagner said. “It will be better than what we had in the last eight years.”