Category: Alert

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Alert

Seattle Parks District wants to hear from you

The Seattle Parks District is asking for your feedback on their current upcoming funding plan.

What is in the plan?

The plan includes six years’ worth of funding spread among 40+ categories going from “Accessibility Barrier Removal to “Youth Mentorship & Employment Opportunities”. And this time around it does mention pickleball.

What is in it for pickleball?

The good parts

  • They expect to get 16+ dedicated, lighted outdoor pickleball courts to be added across two locations by 2028.
  • They are increasing the amount of money allocated to maintain and renovate existing outdoor courts.
  • They are planning to increase community centers operating hours by 9% and to reallocate hours to increase evening and weekend access.

The parts to question

  • The funding seems too small to lead to the addition of 16+ dedicated, lighted pickleball courts.
  • It’s not clear if part of the funding would be available to add more pickleball court lines to existing tennis courts and to buy semi-permanent pickleball nets.
  • There is no plan to increase indoor pickleball.

How can I help?

Please send an email to Seattle Park District Planning (PDPlanning@seattle.gov) and to the Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioners (Rachel.Acosta@seattle.gov).

Thank them for supporting outdoor pickleball in their current budget proposal by enabling Seattle Parks to construct two new dedicated outdoor pickleball facilities with lights. Ask them to allocate money to acquire semi-permanent pickleball nets, because pickleball court lines are not enough.

Thank them for increasing funding to allow expanded operating hours at community centers. Ask that some of the new hours be allocated to restore indoor pickleball hours that were cut in 2019 due to lack of funds.

Feel free to add your favorite pickleball topic: getting pickleball lines painted in a color that we can actually see such as yellow or orange, getting better density of pickleball courts, getting dedicated pickleball times on dual-use courts, adding pickleball court lines on the tennis courts located next to community centers, getting pickleball courts with lights in the short-term, etc.

Can you make it easy?

Sure thing. We already did most of the work for you. Click here to get started.

Just remember to sign at the bottom. And add a paragraph with your own favorite pickleball request if you wish.

Where can I find more information?

You can find the part of the budget proposal called “Racket Sport Maintenance and Expansion” here.

You can find the part of the proposed budget called “Community Center Operations” here.

Here is the Park District Funding Plan‘s web page.

Here is the Board of Park and Recreation Commissioners web page. The Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioners is charged with holding public meetings and making recommendations to the Superintendent of Seattle Parks and Recreation for each six-year cycle of the Park District.

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Alert

Seattle Parks’ 2022 Pickleball Public Meeting #1: Why, What and How To

Seattle Parks’ first of two public meetings on the future of outdoor pickleball will take place online this coming Wednesday, March 30, at 4:30pm. You can register for it here.

What is the purpose of this meeting?

Seattle Parks purpose is “seeking input from tennis and pickleball players on how we can best support the growth of pickleball.”

There will be a second meeting in April, where Seattle Parks will present the next version of their plan, incorporating your feedback as they see fit.

What will be the format of this online meeting?

At the online meeting, SPR will present their current plan for about 15 minutes. Then there will be a poll for 5 to 10 minutes, followed by breakout rooms for about 20 minutes where you should have a chance to express your views about the plan and anything else you want to say. Each breakout room will have a facilitator that will take notes.

UPDATE: Too many people registered to attend this meeting to have breakout rooms. Use the Zoom chat box instead to make your voice heard if needed.

Why are tennis players invited to speak on the future of pickleball?

Seattle Parks decided that if they were going to continue adding pickleball lines on existing public outdoor tennis courts, they needed to get the tennis community involved. 

What is in Seattle Parks’ current plan?

We’ll find out at the meeting. We expect the current plan to contain:

  1. A new standard for painting pickleball court lines on existing public outdoor tennis courts. Unfortunately, this standard is likely to get us new courts that look a lot like the old ones: with only two pickleball courts per tennis court, even if there is space for more; and with blue pickleball lines, even though yellow lines would be much easier to see.
  2. Possibly a tentative list of new tennis courts that will receive pickleball court lines. Will this list be mostly made of unloved tennis courts? Will it include the outdoor tennis courts located by the community centers? Will we see pickleball courts with decent lights for evening play?
  3. Possible locations for dedicated pickleball courts.
    • Seattle Parks might propose to create dedicated pickleball courts at a few tennis court locations that currently see no school use and very little tennis use. This could be an easy way to get a few dedicated pickleball courts in the near future.  Details unknown.  This is likely to be better than not having any dedicated pickleball courts at all, and to be only a very small part of the pickleball puzzle that needs to be solved.
    • Seattle Parks plan might propose one or more locations for dedicated pickleball courts to be developed in the very long term.

How can I help?

UPDATE: Too many people registered to attend this meeting to have breakout rooms. Use the Zoom chat box instead to make your voice heard if needed.

In the breakout rooms section of the meeting, find a way to ask for one or more of the following:

  1. Ask to have more than 2 pickleball courts per tennis court (See this blog entry to find out why)

SPR opposes this because :

  • it would be too confusing for both tennis and pickleball players
  • it makes it too difficult to rent courts
  • it is not safe

Possible rebuttals:

  • Pickleball players have taped multiple pickleball courts on the middle tennis court at Green Lake and pickleball players are not confused by the lines.  The Seattle Community Center gyms have lines for multiple sports and somehow people manage. Seattle’s public turf fields are all lined for multiple sports in such a way that no lines from a single sport dominate. 
  • Shoreline manages to rent courts at locations where they have more than 2 pickleball courts per tennis courts
  • Edmonds painted lines for 4 pickleball courts on each pickleball court at Yost Park. Shoreline painted lines for 6 pickleball courts on 2 tennis courts at Shoreline Park and Shoreview Park, without this raising any safety concerns.
  • Why should the number of pickleball courts painted at a tennis location be limited by the people who can afford to rent courts?
  1. Ask to have pickleball lines that we can clearly see: Ask for yellow pickleball court lines.

SPR is currently considering this request but is likely to oppose it because:

  • yellow pickleball lines would be too distracting or confusing for tennis players

Possible rebuttals:

  • On all the other multi-sports fields and courts, no sport is privileged over the others. There is no reason to make an exception for tennis players.
  • Tennis players who find the pickleball lines too distracting have the option to go play on one of the many tennis courts that do not have pickleball lines. 
  • Pickleball players should not be treated as second class citizens. Pickleball lines should not be treated as second class lines.
  1. Ask to have pickleball court lines on all the tennis courts located next to community centers.

Seattle Parks is likely to oppose pickleball lines at locations such as Jefferson Park, Rainier Playfield or Rainier Beach because these are “premium” courts in good shape with lights, bathrooms, parking, and water fountains and therefore are in high demand with tennis players.

They might agree to having some pickleball court lines at Meadowbrook and Hiawatha.

  1. Ask to have pickleball courts with decent lights for evening play located in North Seattle, West Seattle, and Southeast Seattle. There is some chance SPR might already provide for this in their plan, in which case it is important that we show support for it so they don’t change their mind.

Seattle Parks will probably oppose this because:

  • the courts with decent lights are also very desirable for tennis players and therefore already heavily used (by tennis players)

Possible Rebuttals:

  • Pickleball players should not be treated as second class citizens.
  • If Seattle Parks doesn’t offer lighted pickleball courts, only pickleball players who have the means to drive out of the city to find lighted courts in places such as Shoreline or Auburn will have access to evening pickleball.
  • Seattle Parks could add new lights to some existing courts that don’t have any and make them available to pickleball players.
  1. Ask to have time reserved for “open play” pickleball on some of the dual use courts.  For instance, “Priority for open play pickleball Monday to Friday, 9am to noon at Delridge courts”

SPR has opposed this in the past because:

  • they want you to pay to reserve the courts for such use.
  • they are invested in the tennis culture of having twosomes or foursomes meeting at a specific time at a specific place, and they would like pickleball players to fit the tennis mold.

Possible rebuttal:

  • SPR already reserves all courts for pickleball open play at specific times at Delridge, Miller and Walt Hundley. These programs are remarkably successful. We want to extend them.
  • Open play fosters community building. This requires several pickleball courts to be available in the same location for several hours.
  • During low usage time, such as during weekday mornings, tennis players have access to several tennis-only courts within a few miles of any existing pickleball courts. Open play pickleball players do not have the same flexibility.

Extra Bonus Points

Ask what the decision process is.

What is going to be done with meeting participants’ input?  Who is going to write the recommendations based on the input? What are their job titles and qualifications? Will a pickleball player representative be included in the process?  Who is going to make a final decision based on the recommendations? What are their job titles and qualifications?   Check out this blog for more information.

Thank you for participating. Please spread the word.

Categories
Alert

Wait Less. Play More.

Have you ever had to wait a long time to get on a pickleball court during open play?

Most Seattle outdoor pickleball courts could accommodate 50% or more courts than they already do. On two side-by-side tennis courts, Edmonds paints lines for eight pickleball courts, Shoreline paints six pickleball courts, and Seattle only paints four.

If Seattle followed Edmonds’ or Shoreline’s lead we could have many more pickleball courts on the outdoor tennis courts that already have pickleball lines. For instance, Green Lake could have 8 to 10 courts instead of 6; High Point, Brighton Park, and Mount Baker could have 6 courts instead of 4; Magnolia could have 12 courts instead of 8.

What can you do about it?

1. Attend Seattle Parks’ March 30 public meeting

Attend Seattle Parks’ first of two public meetings on the future of outdoor pickleball online on Wednesday, March 30, at 4:30pm. Make sure you tell them to paint more than two pickleball courts per tennis court. Register now to attend this meeting.

2. Get the mayor and city council involved

The mayor and the city council have the power of the purse. Tell them that it is time for Seattle Parks to follow Edmonds and Shoreline’s lead, and make better use of Seattle’s existing tennis courts real estate by painting more than two pickleball courts per tennis court.

Click here to get started sending them an email. Here is what you could say:

Dear Mayor Harrell,

Dear Public Assets Committee Chair Lewis,

Dear Public Assets Committee Members Herbold, Juarez, Morales and Mosqueda,

As a pickleball player, I am dismayed to see that Seattle Parks still chooses to make very poor use of the available court real estate when adding pickleball court lines to existing tennis courts.  For instance, in a location with two tennis courts side by side, Edmonds Parks fits lines for 8 pickleball courts at Yost Park, Shoreline fits lines for 6 pickleball courts at Shoreline Parks, but Seattle persist on only wanting to paint lines for four pickleball courts in the same space.

Why doesn’t Seattle Parks want to have more than two pickleball courts per tennis court?  Because Seattle Parks doesn’t want to inconvenience tennis players with too many pickleball lines and it says that having a higher pickleball court density would make it difficult to manage court reservations. The Edmonds and Shoreline Parks departments have been able to surmount these obstacles. Certainly Seattle Parks can follow suit.

Long lines of pickleball players waiting to participate in open play sessions are often seen in places such as the Green Lake, Walt Hundley, and Miller courts on clement weather days. Maximizing the number of pickleball courts at these (and all other) locations would increase the number of courts by 50% or more for the price of a few painted lines. Given that the number of pickleball players is growing exponentially and is projected to surpass the number of tennis players in the next ten years, this simple space usage optimization needs to be implemented sooner than later.

Please encourage Seattle Parks to make the best usage of available court space by painting lines for more than two pickleball courts per tennis court when designating courts for dual tennis and pickleball use.

If you prefer to do it on your own here is all the information you need:

See you online on Wednesday March 30th at 4:30pm.

Categories
Alert

Join the Redmond Parks and Trails Commission

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a pickleball player become one of Redmond’s Parks and Trails commissioners?

The city of Redmond is recruiting applicants to fill one vacancy on the Parks and Trails Commission. The city is committed to having a commission that reflects the diversity of the community and welcomes applications from any resident living within the 98052 zip code who is interested in the future of Redmond parks, recreation, and trails, including those who may have applied for past vacancies.

If you are interested, you can find more information here.

Pass it on.

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Alert

Lynnwood Players: Join ParksLove

The city of Lynnwood is looking for 25 community members to advise them during the creation of a comprehensive park and trail capital project plan that identifies system needs and prioritizes future investments to achieve their equitable park planning goals.

Translation: Lynnwood is going to decide which new parks projects it will fund. Wouldn’t it be nice to have at least one pickleball player on this advisory group? If you joined, you would only have to attend 6 to 8 meetings between April 2022 and August 2023 with each meeting lasting 1 to 3 hours.

If you are considering participating in this project, please take 10 minutes to complete this short survey by February 28.  

Pass it on.

More information here: www.LynnwoodWa.gov/ParksLove

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Alert

Seattle Parks and Recreation Needs Your Input on the Future of Pickleball in Seattle’s Parks

Seattle Parks and Recreation (SPR) is seeking input from tennis and pickleball players on how they can best support the growth of pickleball. Everyone is encouraged to participate in their short survey.

Before you get started, take a moment to imagine what you would like Seattle Parks to do to support pickleball players in the future. Make sure you share it in the last question of the survey which will ask you “Do you have any other thoughts or ideas to share about pickleball or tennis in Seattle“?

Take the survey here before February 8th. Remember to share your vision for Seattle pickleball in the last question.

Need more information? You can find SPR’s announcement of their survey here.

Pass it on.

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Alert

Action Alert: Help Make Pickleball Washington State’s Official State Sport

What Bill?

Bill 5615, to make pickleball the official sport of the state of Washington, has been assigned a hearing date for Wednesday January 12th, 2022 at 8:00 am (video), and for a Senate vote on Friday January 14th at 10:30 am (video).

After the bill clears the Senate hearing and Senate vote, a vote will be scheduled in the House sometime in February.

What should I do NOW?

ACTION 1: Now is the time to leave a comment in support of this bill, so your state representatives know you want them to vote for it! The form is super easy to fill out and your comment will be sent directly to your senator and/or representatives for your district. You can do it in less than 2 minutes. If you don’t know what to write, just say “I support bill SB 5615 to designate pickleball as the official sport of the state of Washington.“

Senators John Lovick of Mill Creek and Sam Hunt from Olympia, who introduced this bill, want as many people as possible doing this, a minimum of 100 to 200 statements of support if we can. Let’s give them thousands!

ACTION 2: We need folks from all over the state to submit comments, so share the link with your pickleball friends across Washington.

What else can I do now?

If you have the time, write letters to newspaper editors in support of the bill.

What next?

There is such a buzz in the pickleball community about this bill, you will surely hear about new developments. The Seattle Metro Pickleball Association will issue further action alerts as needed.

Meanwhile, you can watch the video of the public hearing in the Senate Committee on State Government & Elections on Wednesday 1/12/2022 at 8:00 am, and the video of the Senate vote on Friday 1/14/2022 at 10:30 am.

How can I track this bill’s status?

Check out its official web page on the Washington State Legislature web site.

January 31 Update

The bill will get a Senate vote next Wednesday, February 2nd. If it passes it then goes to the House for a vote, and then to the governor’s desk for signature.

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Alert

Action Alert: Help Determine the Priorities for Kirkland’s Parks and Recreational Facilities

The City of Kirkland is developing a comprehensive parks, recreation, and open space master plan to see where their parks can grow, how their programs can expand, what improvements their facilities need and ways to better serve their community. 

Many of you have already asked for more (lighted, covered, outdoor) pickleball courts in Kirkland. It’s important that we ask again, so they know that the demand for more pickleball courts still exists.

Kirkland Parks will need to hear from pickleball players at their online public meeting on December 15, 2021 at 6:30 p.m. Register for this meeting.

A nationally known parks and recreation management consulting firm will present the results of a needs assessment survey, a detailed analysis of park conditions and park amenities, and demographics and trends used in the planning process. In addition to providing up-to-date status on the master plan, there will also be opportunities to confirm the findings and provide additional input.

The meeting will be held virtually and it should last approximately 90 minutes. You will have the opportunity to take part in polls, ask questions in the chat room and participate in a question-and-answer period. This community conversation meeting will help determine the priorities for Kirkland’s parks and recreational facilities.

They want to hear from community members of all ages and from all neighborhoods.

Register now for this meeting to be held on Wednesday, December 15, 2021 at 6:30 p.m.

If you live, work or play pickleball in Kirkland, this meeting is for you.

Pass it on! Let all your pickleball friends know.

Got Questions? Call (425) 587-3315 or email playitforward@kirklandwa.gov. Visit the Parks, Recreation and Open Space (PROS) Plan website for additional updates.

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Alert

Action Alert: Ask Redmond for Pickleball Court Clusters

Another day, another survey.

Who?

This time the University of Washington-Landscape Architecture, the Integrated Ecology Lab and the City of Redmond (Parks & Recreation) would like to analyze your experience of Redmond’s parks and trails, and determine the impact of COVID-19 related social distance measures on these parks and trails’ attendance.

What? (…does this have to do with pickleball)?

The last question of the survey is “What would you like to see from our public parks as we move forward in a post COVID World?” That is your chance to answer “More lighted, covered pickleball courts clustered together in groups of 8 or more. Pickleball is a great intergenerational physical activity with a strong social component. (https://youtu.be/GMtEePVkZac?t=261).“

Why?

Redmond already has many pickleball courts scattered throughout the city. It needs a pickleball venue with many pickleball courts next to each other, where players can congregate all day for open play and know that they will find other players at their level.

When?

Today of course! And definitely before December 5th, 2021.

Where?

Redmond’s Parks & Trails Survey 2021 (google.com)

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Alert

Action Alert: Help us get $50,000 for pickleball lines!

Seattle City Council member Tammy Morales is sponsoring a city budget amendment titled “Add $50,000 GF to SPR to support adding pickleball court lines to existing tennis courts” in Seattle. Dan Strauss and Kshama Sawant are co-sponsors. 

Please send all three an email to thank them for this.

This amendment still needs to be voted on by the entire Seattle City Council. Please email the entire city council as well to ask them vote in favor of this amendment. 

Here is a tip: click on each of the words “email” above to get a head start.

Thank you!