Evesham Township Council approved the bonding of $1.5 million for the construction of synthetic turf soccer fields at the Memorial Sports Complex at its last meeting, but not without some feedback from the public.
Several residents used the public comment portion of the meeting to ask questions regarding costs and how the project was chosen over other possible options for spending the money.
Resident Joanne Sanferraro questioned comments made at a previous meeting in which Councilman Ken D’Andrea said more than 2,000 kids in the Marlton Soccer Program, of which D’Andrea is commissioner, would use the fields.
Due to that fact, D’Andrea said the Marlton Soccer Program would be paying for about 25 percent of the cost of the fields, with another 25 percent or so to hopefully come from renting the fields to other organizations.
It was there that Sanferraro took issue, questioning the need to spend money on fields for kids in town if other outside groups were needed to help offset the cost.
“This doesn’t make sense to me,” Sanferraro said. “Are you building this field for the town, or for the teams outside of the town who can rent space, so then where do our teams go?”
D’Andrea responded to Sanferraro by saying first priority would be given to the Marlton Soccer organization before any field was out to rent to other organizations, and that the other organizations in questions were also local.
Sanferraro also brought up health concerns she said may correlate with the use of turf fields and asked what assurances the township received were not a risk, but Mayor Randy Brown said those concerns were unfounded.
“We’ve got multiple turf fields here in town,” Brown said. “If you go back to 2008–2009, we sat in this room and went all over the supposed health hazards that are non-existent and not proven by any sort of medical professional about turf fields.”
Resident Rosemary Bernardi asked about open space money being used for the project, and when she was informed it was not, she asked how it was decided to build fields versus paving roads or other needs of the town.
Brown said he and council have been for active recreation to have homes keep value and attract new residents.
“We have an overall plan of how, not only do we stabilizes taxes around here, but we also make it very attractive for people to live here, for people to play here, for people to work here and for people to move here, so this continues to be our overall plan,” Brown said.
Evesham Township Manager Tom Czerniecki also said the $1.5 million price was chosen based on a “worst case scenario” in which he already believed less would be needed, and some of the bond would be cancelled.
Resident Cheryl Wilkins asked about the declining numbers of children in the town based off of school district enrollment projections, but Brown said participation in the soccer program and many youth sports was actually higher than it was several years ago.
“Whether we have 5,000 kids in school or 4,400 kids in school, it’s participation,” he said.
Resident Dominick Mondi said as an eight-year resident with a family, he was for the fields, especially because of the Marlton Soccer Program helping pay for the cost.
“That’s not just dollars, that’s buy-in from the community beyond the people sitting in this room,” Mondi said. “I think it’s a good idea, and just as a counterbalance to some of the comments we’ve heard, I think you’re moving in the right direction.”
