Brooklyn Parks Commissioner Marty Maher has persistently mentioned that the tennis courts at Mattress-Stuy’s Jackie Robinson Park Playground are going to stay closed till April.
Mattress-Stuy residents began a Change.org petition in mid-January to attempt to get the commissioner to open the tennis courts for low season use or give a legitimate motive for holding them closed. They are saying they need to have the ability to use them through the winter, the identical means the borough’s different walk-on tennis courtroom services are getting used.
However, thus far, the Parks Division has solely responded to AmNews inquiries about this example by insisting that the courts are closed this winter due to “repeated vandalism and misuse through the prior season.”
“They need us to imagine this stuff,” Frances Ferdinand, the director of HQ Tennis LLC, mentioned in response to these claims, “however I really feel like that’s a really political reply as a result of we all know that that’s not the case.” Coach Ferdinand has been using the Jackie Robinson Park tennis courts for the previous 5 years to each give tennis instruction and sponsor free and low-cost lessons for teenagers and adults.
Seeing that selling park use made the neighborhood safer, Ferdinand and members of the Mates of Jackie Robinson Park Playground, advocated for renovations that noticed the tennis courts resurfaced and repainted. She was shocked final spring, although, when her firm was outbid by a tennis firm that was new to the neighborhood for the unique proper to show lessons on the park’s 4 tennis courts.
Some group members imagine all the neighborhood is being penalized as a result of they spoke out in opposition to the Parks Division’s highest bidder courtroom concessions course of. They declare that now everyone seems to be being restricted from accessing the tennis courts.
“That is the primary time within the 5 years that I’ve been teaching and the years that I’ve been round Brooklyn that I do know for these courts to be locked through the winter like this,” Ferdinand mentioned in disappointment. “Like if individuals are courageous sufficient to play outside within the winter, then they need to be capable to do it. It’s loopy to me that you’d shut off part of the park. The entire park will not be closed. If I need to play basketball, I can play basketball. If I need to play handball, I can play handball. If my youngsters need to play within the park and swing on the swings, they will do this. But when I need to play tennis, that’s the one factor that’s locked.”
For devoted tennis fanatics, there are many days throughout winter when out of doors tennis matches might be performed. This is without doubt one of the advantages of residing in a metropolis like New York, a spot lately acknowledged by the non-public finance web site WalletHub because the nation’s second-best metropolis for an energetic way of life. The town offers a lot of alternatives for participating in bodily train. In line with the location’s survey, New York affords dance colleges, swimming classes, bike rental providers, basketball courts, soccer fields, ice rinks, and the second-highest variety of playgrounds per capita –– all facilities that supply folks possibilities to keep up health.
NYC Parks Division rules state that the general public is required to have entry to parks and that “out of doors tennis courts are open day by day, climate allowing, besides when below development or restore, or when reserved for tournaments or particular occasions.”
Kenny Bruno, one other native tennis participant who’s annoyed by the closing off of the courts, instructed the AmNews that he had spoken to Commissioner Maher, who “instructed me that the choice to shut the courts for the winter was made by the Income Division and he abided by it.” However when Bruno additionally spoke with representatives of NYC Parks Division Commissioner Sue Donoghue, he was instructed that the commissioner herself closed the courts, not due to vandalism or due to something to do with the Income Division. There had been three incidents the place folks felt threatened on the courts, and since there was no Parks personnel out there to observe the realm, the commissioner determined to lock it down.
Councilmember Chi Ossé’s workplace has not responded to quite a few requests for remark about what is going on with the Jackie Robinson’s Park tennis courts. However the workplace of State Sen. Jabari Brisport, who additionally represents the district, mentioned that although they don’t have jurisdiction over the Parks Division as a result of it’s a metropolis company, they’ve reached out to Maher’s workplace to advocate for the courts’ re-opening. “I’ve reached out to NYC Parks about this, they usually haven’t supplied enough justification for punishing a whole group by closing its courts for the entire season,” Sen. Brisport mentioned in a press release. “Public areas like these courts present a spot for group members to attach with one another, to keep up their bodily and emotional wellbeing, and to expertise pleasure collectively; they aren’t trivial and shouldn’t be withheld from the general public they had been constructed to profit.”
The Parks Division mentioned in a press release to the AmNews, “We look ahead to reopening the courts in April when the tennis season begins. To assist guarantee compliance and security for each Parks employees and the group, Parks will station a seasonal tennis attendant on the courts. We respect the group’s advocacy and look ahead to reopening quickly. We’ve been in communication with the native council member and group board about this problem.”
