“Southeast Seattle Needs Outdoor Pickleball Courts Now: The Saga” – EPISODE 6

A Slap In the Face

JUN 17, 2021 — 

Here is Seattle Parks’ most recent answer to our requests.

Not surprisingly, this most recent reply still does not directly address any of our requests. Instead, it calls them suggestions.  And it proposes that some Park employee without the power to make any significant decision can coordinate with other staff to see if they can work something out. We know better.  

It does not address the fact that Seattle Parks chose the most undesirable tennis courts to make them available to pickleball players. 

It does not answer how Seattle Parks measured “high-demand” areas for pickleball in Southeast Seattle and managed to exclude Jefferson and Rainier from the results.

It suggests that we raise funds to donate more semi-permanent outdoor pickleball nets until Seattle Parks has enough nets for every painted pickleball court.

It mentions that Seattle Parks now has a “citywide pickleball planning committee”, but it fails to mention if this committee contains any representatives of the pickleball community. It certainly does not have any representative from the Seattle Metro Pickleball Association, or any of the Southeast Seattle pickleball players who sent this petition to the Superintendent. We suspect it is made exclusively of Parks employees, some of which work for the Amy Yee tennis center.

Finally, it mentions that Seattle Parks’ staff plan to meet with the Seattle Metro Pickleball Association (SMPA) board members at least quarterly. Is this supposed to be some sort of substitute for the meeting we, Southeast Seattle pickleball players, asked to have with the Superintendent?

As one of the recipients of this email said: “this is what a slap in the face feels like”.

You can read the full email from Seattle Parks below.

Next: Episode 7: Greetings Mayor Durkan