At Piper Park, a 3-0 vote to end shared tennis-pickleball courts
Parks and Recreation Director Nick Stone came to Thursday's commission meeting with a plan he knew would not go over easily: end the mixed-use arrangement at Piper Park's four courts. Under his proposal, court 4 would become four dedicated pickleball courts with permanent nets and a waiting deck, and courts 1 through 3 would be dedicated to tennis. Today, eight temporary pickleball lines are striped across courts 3 and 4. The change would ride along with a planned resurfacing job of roughly $100,000, which depends on the City Council approving capital improvement funds in May, and would also take out the oleander bushes Stone called "tennis court assassins" and address courts that are sinking and sloping because the park sits on an old dump site.
“Cutting those in half is a 50% reduction in what's available to pickleball players. That doesn't feel like a compromise. It feels like a massacre.”— Dan Newuhart, during public comment
Stone framed the split as the only fiscally and logistically workable long-term fix, pointing to court damage from heavy portable pickleball nets, scheduling conflicts, noise complaints, the lack of restrooms, and the cost of building standalone courts. "Sandbags are designed to stop flood waters, not tennis courts," he told the commission. He opened by conceding the obvious: "So tonight I'm going to be proposing a long-term solution to what's going on out here. It's not a popular one. I know that."
Public comment split hard along sport lines. Pickleball players said the math doesn't work for them. "Cutting those in half is a 50% reduction in what's available to pickleball players," said Dan Newuhart. "That doesn't feel like a compromise. It feels like a massacre." Rebecca Harris said that "every weekend and nearly every weekday, all eight courts... are in full use, often with 10 to 30 pickleball players waiting, often while the dedicated tennis courts sit empty." Eric Bowen asked the commission to hold off and have Stone "work with the pickleball community to try to come up with better solutions," and Chuck Finny said flatly, "I don't think the answer is to eliminate half the courts." Nathan Becker called the reduction "devastating to this really special community."
Tennis players backed the plan, or wanted more. Coach Leo Geraldi said, "We are in favor of the proposal that Nick Stone submitted... it's a compromise. Nobody's going to get exactly what they want." Laura Mcder argued the pickleball assignment isn't a downgrade: "Court 4 is the best court you get... Court three sucks. It really does." Joanne Blumbrren described being pushed off a court — "I have been kicked off, tried to be kicked off the courts by pickleball players who say, 'There are more of us than you. Get off.'" — and asked instead that court 3 stay dual-use with strict rules on who plays when. Commissioners Harrison and Sunshine and Chair Fidell all voted yes on a roll call, 3-0, with Commissioners Baxter and Capel absent, sending the recommendation to the City Council. Stone closed with a note on tone: "We followed a municipal process. It may not be what everybody wants here, but they need to be respectful when you're here. These are volunteers up here."