SubscribeIn parks across the Washington region, neighbors keep creeping into the commons. Whether sneaky, stubborn, earnest or oblivious, these modern-day squatters have been nibbling at public land with verve. There are gardens and sheds, a Frisbee golf course and ball courts. The incursions have spurred discord in quiet cul-de-sacs and a sharp debate over citizenship, the environment and just what makes a park a park.
"We call it encroachment. That's just a very kind, politically correct word for trespassing," said Michael Rierson, resource protection chief for the Fairfax County Park Authority.
I really can't imagine having the sense of entitlement you'd need to commandeer public space the way these kids did.This has to be parody. Seriously--you really can't imagine? They're kids. Kids do stuff like this. Kids everywhere, rich kids, poor kids, in America, and elsewhere. Always have, always will. Anywhere there are kids, you'll see makeshift soccer fields, or bike paths, or basketball goals set up at the end of cul-de-sacs. We dammed streams, shot birds with our BB guns, even tried to build a log cabin, cut down a bunch of trees before we figured out it was too hard. And not on our land, either--just out in "the woods," which belonged to somebody, I suppose, but not to us or our parents, certainly.
This being Greenwich, they decided not to go quietly. They and/or parents alerted the local newspaper and politicians up to Lt. Gov. Michael Fedele of nearby Stamford.There's some merit to this response. What an education in law, public property, and use of the civic channels for complaint and change. And yet, there's also something that seems a little entitled about it. If I had suggested that my mom call the lt. governor when they tore down our awesome bike jump, I guarantee you that conversation would not have gone very far. And it's true that few American communities already offer as many recreational facilities as Greenwich, CT., which is one of the wealthiest towns in the nation (second most wealthy by measure of land value per capita), with a per capita net worth of $430,000. It is not because these kids' story is more important than the kids in the NYC boroughs who are being exposed to environmental pollutants - it's that these kids, children of well-educated, savvy, well-connected major campaign donors, have a kind of political pull and access to power that poor kids can hardly hope to muster.
All kids deserve a Huck Finn summer. We perhaps have lost our collective minds about our overscheduled, overstressed young. But, in the end, maybe there was a reason that Kevin Costner built that Field of Dreams in Iowa and not in Greenwich.All kids deserve a Huck Finn summer? Is this the official editorial stance of the New York Times? "Our" overscheduled, overstressed young - who's the "us" whose kids are so overscheduled? Do poor kids in less affluent areas deserve a Huck Finn summer, too? If they do, why is the story that's actually more threatening to kids' health being buried while this one is being featured?
A passing breeze gently shook an American flag on a patch of town-owned dirt on Riverside Lane, where an odd assortment of scented candles, yard tools and wiffle ball bats remained to be picked up.
Enroute to a Wiffle ball tournament, Justin Provenzano, 17, made a quick stop to see the remains of the dismantled Wiffle ball field he helped create with other teens.
"I'm angry," Provenzano said. "We've kept playing Wiffle ball other places but it's not the same."
After a two week battle between a neighborhood group of teens and neighboring homeowners over the existence of a Wiffle ball field kids built on town land, town workers carted the field away on Friday morning.
The town has offered the youths an alternative of using a field at the International School of Dundee for the remainder of the summer for Wiffle ball.
The field included a plywood replica of Fenway Park's Green Monster, bleachers, a foul pole, and a back stop which had replaced a dense overgrowth in the town owned lot.
"I've learned that even if 99 percent of the people in town want something one percent can stop it," Provenzano said.
Set aside as a drainage area between homes, First Selectman Peter Tesei said last week that the property posed liability issues.
An exposed drain behind home plate could result in injury for the teens, and neighboring properties could be damaged by wiffle-ballers.
Yesterday Robert Bellantoni, of Riverside Lane, questioned the legitimacy of the drainage and liability issues raised, stating the latter could have easily been resolved with waivers.
His son Timothy and other teens who put up the field should be proud of their efforts, he said.
"I understand the town insures the property whether it is used or not so what is the difference?" Bellantoni said. "The town has slammed the door in these kids faces and what kind of message does that send?"
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They've been playing too much wiffleball and not paying enough attention to local news: this outcome was entirely predictable.
posted by OmieWise at 7:10 AM on July 10, 2008 [2 favorites]