THE GUELPH LAKE BALL DIAMONDS ARE OPEN FOR BUSINESS!!!

The city has tried to drum it into our heads to check out the Sportsfield Status link on the City of Guelph website before heading out to the diamonds … and then they go and post that they’re closed! After following up on this with a phone call to the city, I have determined that this is only supposed to apply to the multi-use fields (ie. soccer/football/ultimate frisbee) and the gates should be open and the ball diamonds should be available.

I will be in contact with the city webmaster to try and get this clarified in the future on their site – but that ain’t gonna happen tonight!

Go out there … have some fun – and let’s have a great ball season!!

Information Bulletin

To: City of Guelph Outdoor Facility Users
From: Murray Cameron– Manager of Parklands and Greenways
Department: Operations

RE: 2010 Operating Budget

We write to follow up on our information bulletin of November 25, 2009, wherein we advised that Council was considering a number of rate increases in an effort to deal with a difficult budget. We thank those who took the time to appear as a delegation, or to contact the Mayor and Council in this regard.

In preparation for the budget staff restructured our proposed rates and fees, and we are attaching a copy of the new rates and fees with this bulletin. In our view these new rates continue to represent good value and our very competitive with the rates in surrounding communities.

A decrease in the Youth Subsidy from 47.5% to 40% was considered by Council, but was rejected, so approved youth groups will continue to enjoy the youth subsidy throughout 2010.

Please be aware that although these rates come into effect on January 1, 2010, all existing signed contracts will be honoured at the stated rate.

Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Best regards,

Murray Cameron
Manager
Parklands and Greenways
Operations

Also attached to that message was a Fee Schedule that had some rather disconcerting information.

Upon first reading the updated fees, it appeared that we would be hit with a very substantial increase in our diamond costs due to a revision in how they made their calculations. More specifically, in years past we have always received a discounted rate when renting more diamonds – the cost for 1 diamond was about $60, while booking all 4 only came to about $110.

The new way of doing things is to rent each diamond individually and by the hour – with no allowance for a bulk discount.

While the League Executives have yet to get together and analyze the full impact of these changes, subsequent communications back and forth have eased some of our fears and I feel confident we can come out of this without feeling TOO much of an impact. Some changes will need to be made in our approach to diamond usage but, until we’ve had a chance to look at this a little more in-depth, we will continue to plan for the coming season as we have in years past.

More information will be available when we begin the League Meetings.

You may have noticed that the Forum is no longer available – and thus the Free Agents list. There were some issues with compatibility between the main site and the forum, as well as a lot of attempts at SPAM from Russia (I can pick those ones out the easiest by the .ru email address), so I thought it best to drop the whole thing until I could come up with something a little better. I will be adding a Free Agents list in the next couple of weeks, but there are some other maintenance issues I need to take care of before that will happen.

Having said that – if the site somehow goes missing or you notice some problems with it in the next little bit (here’s hoping that doesn’t happen, but …) rest assured that it will be back.

In the meantime, for those interested in putting a team into either league, you can go to the Contact page for that league and fill out the form with your request.

I know I don’t need to remind everyone of the importance of completing your games as scheduled because of the GG4 lighting situation, but I do want to remind everyone that all players must be listed on your roster before taking the field for your team. Teams have 20-man rosters to account for those games when your “regulars” can’t make a game for whatever reason – and you might have to dig deep in that roster when it comes to this time of year. Please resist the urge to pick up just anyone to fill in for a night as non-roster players will not be covered by insurance should something happen.

In the event someone chooses to protest a game because of non-rostered players, you should be aware that a successful protest will result in the forfeiture of the game by the offending team.

This is just a reminder that games are all set to play as scheduled when City diamonds are open – subject to a “game-time” decision by the umpire. That means you have to go out to the diamonds ready to play unless your team gets a call from the league (in which case, something should also be posted here).

Thanks for your cooperation.