SAN DIEGO — Cracked tennis courts and torn up soccer fields are among some of the needed repairs and upgrades at the Encanto Recreation Center. CBS 8 is Working for You to find out how the City of San Diego plans to address the needs there.
“The needs are great here. The building is old. There’s a lot of things that have not been upgraded,” said Evelyn Smith, whose lived in the neighborhood for 50 years and serves as a volunteer on the City’s Parks and Recreation Board.
With cracks in the surface of the outdoor basketball courts and tennis courts in even worse shape with a posted sign indicating they’re closed and unusable, parents and families in the neighborhood hope the backlog of repairs will be addressed soon.
“It’s just a lot that needs to be done that they’re not able to do right now,” said Smith.
Additionally, much of the grass turf on the soccer fields is torn up, making things difficult for the kids who play little league there.
“Yeah, a lot of patches, not clear areas with too much dirt around there, it’s uneven,” said Nestor Olivo, founder of Olivo Little League. “It causes it to be uneven. Sometimes players have gotten hurt in the past because it’s hard to keep it stable all the time.”
Inside the rec center, the indoor basketball court has been resurfaced and repainted by the city, but neither the air conditioning nor the oven in the kitchen are in working condition.
“As we all know, funds are tight and they’re understaffed,” said Smith.
We reached out to the City of San Diego’s Parks and Recreation Department Friday morning about the maintenance issues and did not receive a response by the time this story aired Wednesday evening.
Through a public records request, CBS 8 acquired a memo sent in December by the City’s Chief Operating Officer requesting 2% cuts across all departments due to a budget deficit of $172 million for the next fiscal year. For Parks and Rec, that would mean cuts of more than $3.5 million dollars. This coupled with major setbacks from flood damage to other parks in the area make the prospects of fixing issues at the Encanto Rec Center anytime soon even more challenging.
“The funding is tough, very limited,” said Smith. “With the recent disaster that the City suffered, Encanto was one of the communities heavily affected by it, so that’s just going to make things tighter.”
CBS 8 will continue to follow this story.
At CBS 8, we are always Working for You and our community. This is a station promise that we will go the extra mile to solve a problem our audience can’t solve themselves. We want to hear your ideas on how we can cover and help our community. If you have a story idea, please email us at workingforyou@cbs8.com.
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