Sports Association doing
more harm than good

The West Long Branch Sports Association just doesn’t seem to get it.

Over the last few weeks the leaders of the organization have gotten themselves into a ridiculous dispute with the Shore Fall Baseball League over the use of Valenzano Park. It’s a dispute they have complicated with ridiculously petty actions that can only hurt the group in the long run.

Members of the organization first created the problem by failing to seek a reasonable accommodation with the baseball league when they had time to plan. The baseball league first contacted the borough Recreation Commission, which shares some key members with the Sports Association, months ago. Rather than try and work things out when they had time, the members of the Sports Association/Recreation Com-mission tried to ignore the baseball league.

Now the Borough Council has imposed a solution on the Sports Association. The council, which recognizes that it has an obligation to the community beyond the Sports Association, acted far more responsibly.

As much as they wanted to send a message to the association, they sought not to punish the children in the soccer league. They went out of their way to find a measured solution.

Too bad the association cannot seem to act as responsibly.

This marks the second time in less than a year that the association has embarrassed itself with its conduct concerning Valenzano Park.

In the spring, the association took it upon itself to install new lights to illuminate the park’s fields. While the lights were scheduled to go up, the association did the work without informing the Borough Council and ended up violating agreements made with neighbors of the park and damaging the irrigation system installed there.

That rash action left the association with another season of games called on account of darkness as the council, unlike the Sports Association, acted like adults.

The council assured the neighbors that before the lights would go on, the agreed-upon conditions would be met. And the association had to foot the bill for repairs to the irrigation system.

You might think that the serious consequences from doing as it pleased without regard to the obligations they hold to the community at large would have taught the association a lesson. As evidenced by its more recent actions, it has yet to learn that lesson.

It’s past time for this sort of behavior to stop.

Until the Sports Association can learn to follow the rules and play nice, it needs to spend some time on the sidelines.