ILLUSTRATION BY SANDI FALCONER
Drew Tapley is a Mississauga-based writer and principal consultant at WebCopyGroup.com.
The great outdoors would be even greater if we had full access to the parks we pay to use.
More than 500 public parks in Mississauga, where I live, have public sports fields for long-term private rental. Any organization or resident can apply for a permit to occupy a designated, publicly funded sports area (soccer field, baseball diamond, cricket pitch, tennis court, pickleball court, etc.) within a public park for an entire season.
The City of Mississauga does not have a policy to refuse a permit application and, consequently, many public sports fields are booked by a single permit holder all summer.
Each year, the city permits a for-profit summer camp to occupy a publicly funded soccer field for private-paying customers in my local park. This permit covers weekdays, morning through afternoon, for nine consecutive weeks and prohibits the taxpaying public from setting foot on the grass. On weekday evenings, a private soccer club holds a permit to occupy that same soccer field throughout the summer. This leaves it for the general public to use on weekends – that is as long as the city does not issue permits. And just try to find a diamond that isn’t constantly in use by local baseball clubs. The same is true for other sports clubs across the city, which can book all designated public sports fields long-term, including, evidently, the whole summer.
Camps and sports groups need a place to operate, and there’s no arguing that they do benefit some local families as well as the young camp counsellors who work there. But is allowing municipalities to book consecutive weeks and months in the interest of the wider community – including parents with school-aged kids who can’t afford these private camps and clubs?
Every municipality in Canada has the right to make policies about how they use their public sports fields, including subletting them in public parks as an additional revenue stream. Mississauga city councillor and recent mayoral candidate Alvin Tedjo told me that the low permit fee covers basic administration costs and is not a significant source of revenue for the city. These low-cost permits allow clubs and camps to operate at a price point some families can afford. It’s a complex situation because limiting permits for private sports clubs and camps would be problematic for families that rely on them for child care over the summer. However, affordability is relative to household income and expenditure, and families that cannot afford this option need open access to local sports fields for their kids during the summer months, too.
A counterargument can be made for the general public to find another park if their local sports field is unavailable. But isn’t the point of a local park to be local? Proximity matters. Shopping around for available public sports fields is a merry-go-round when permit-holders could potentially occupy any of them at almost any given time.
On a national scale, these for-profit organizations can legally deny access to the general public who pay for those spaces. That is, of course, unless the public pays these organizations directly. When municipalities issue permits for a day, weekend or a week, the assumption is that this serves the broader public interest. But all day, every day, for the whole summer does not consider the majority of children in any community who need those spaces.
Several points of interest converge here, including the need for local businesses to generate income, families to have organized activities and child care for their kids, and the broader community to have an accessible park that’s free and open to use. Mr. Tedjo would like to build more green spaces and partner with school boards to use their sports fields when schools are closed. To some degree, this is already happening, but a joint agreement with school boards would be required to roll this out officially.
If the residents of any community feel inclined to rally support, they can petition their local governments to limit the use of these properties and share them more equitably. Otherwise, negotiating joint agreements with school boards seems a preferred solution to avoid the larger public tax bill for building new sports fields.
If most or all municipalities do not have policies to deny permits for long-term private rental, they inadvertently create undocumented policies that deny the taxpaying public their right to use publicly funded resources during the prime season when the need is greatest.
It’s time to decide whether public parks are all things to all people or some things to some people.