During the last November election, a lot of attention was given to ballfields, and how few of them Maple Valley has (just one). At last night’s council meeting, we got to see three options for finally building ballfields on the south side 22-acre site. Oh, it’s a grand plan, with a couple of fields for soccer and lacrosse, two softball fields, plus five (really?) tennis courts.

Maybe there is a secret society of tennis players in this town, but I’ve never met them. I grew up playing tennis, but my friends in college told me I had the reflexes of a cow, so I don’t play that much anymore.

Instead of natural grass, the city staff likes artificial turf in place of all grass surfaces. It’s more expensive up front, but it’s cheaper over 10 years, and would take fewer people to maintain it. I like artificial turf so much I put it in my backyard; mostly because I’m lazy and I don’t like to do yard work. The fake grass is always green, always the perfect height, and there’s never any standing water (it drains right through). Good call, guys.

The city meeting was a big lovefest regarding the park design and the features, until it came time to talk about the power lines. There are some heavy-duty power transmission lines running over the center of the proposed park, carrying about 230,000 volts at the moment. The Bonneville Power Administration says they’re likely going to add another 500,000 volt line in the near future.

Big power lines? Near the children? Time to dust off your copy of “Secret Cancer Sources That THEY Don’t Want You To Know About”, and get ready for the dubious science debate.

Fortunately, we didn’t have to listen to specific studies of power lines causing cancer (because there aren’t any credible ones), but some of the councilors did express a generalized fear of the power lines, which threatened to derail the entire park project. I can’t say that I completely disagree with the fear, and when I looked to buy a house seven years ago, I intentionally stayed away from the ones under the transmission towers.

But if we really are concerned about the power lines as a health hazard, then we should immediately condemn the houses within a certain distance from the towers, wall off the area, and declare it a dead zone. We’re not going to do that, so we shouldn’t kill this park project for the “safety” of occasional users if we aren’t willing to address the situation of permanent residents near those towers.

Councilor Dana Parnello showed off his math skills from his station, and noted that even a full-time soccer player would only experience 67 days of exposure spread out over a 9-year career. Remind me to vote for this guy next year, will you?

The second buzz kill at this party came when somebody mentioned that we’ll have to find some way to pay for these new ballfields. It’ll probably take $14 Million in bonds to pay for this entire project (over a number of years), and the debate is whether we’ll be asked to plan for the whole project up front, or just a small part of it to get us started.

Three options are available for Phase 1 of construction, which were conveniently named 1A, 1B, and 1C, but should have probably been named the Good, Better, and Best plans. The Good and the Better plans have fewer fields and don’t include toilets, so you’ll have to risk arrest by going in the woods, or hope that the Honey Bucket has been emptied this month.

The challenge for the councilors is to decide which one of these plans will convince you to vote yes for it. Most of the councilors were unwittingly influenced by the psychology of retail pricing theory, which means you always settle for the middle option (Better), but I disagree completely. This town either wants ball fields or it doesn’t, and doing a half-hearted effort won’t benefit the people who would use these fields. We settle for mediocrity far too often in Maple Valley, and I can’t support another cause that continues our streak of being so average.

Whatever your opinion is on the ballfields, now is the time to let your elected representatives know. Save them the trouble of creating a poll, and send them an e-mail at council@maplevalleywa.gov