Dodger Fan, 10, Tosses Pitch for Sports Park in Newhall

Ten-year-old Josh Iniguez swallowed his fear, pulled the microphone down to his level at the City Hall lectern, and haltingly declared to the City Council that he and his friends needed a safer place to play.

An impressed council allotted an additional $100,000 Tuesday night for a new park among the auto repair garages and vacant shops of east Newhall, giving the park a soccer field and basketball court.

Josh’s plea was not the only factor that swayed them, council members said, but it did educate them about the problems faced by children in the surrounding neighborhood. Josh complained that he and his friends wind up playing in the streets, among day laborers urinating on the pavement, because there are no parks nearby.

He said later that he gave up a chance to attend the Dodgers game against the Chicago Cubs to sit with his mother through the three-hour meeting to make a pitch for more facilities at the planned 7-acre Creekview Park near his home. The money for additional facilities was added to the city’s $75-million budget, passed Tuesday night.

“Yeah, I was nervous,” said Josh, when he was congratulated on his effective appeal. “It was like, I wanted it to be perfect. Then I didn’t know what to say.”

Councilwoman Jill Klajic said the council had already decided to spend more money on the park but his three-minute speech sealed the issue. “I think his words were very telling about what’s really going on over there and what the children have to go through,” she said. “We’ve done things that can help. But this tells us we still need to do a lot more.”

Plans for the park were approved in mid-June as part of a $12-million revitalization plan for the area.