The recent thread "Some thoughts on AMA-it's about LAND " has special significance to the soaring community in the Seattle area. Our county designated flying site, 60 Areas South, managed by the Seattle Area Soaring Society (SASS) for the past 30+ years, is now in another fight for its life with a youth soccer association which is looking to expand its facilities. You will recall a few years ago we successfully fought off a water reclamation plant on our site that was a classic case of a public official being bought by a large corporation. Currently the Lake Washington Youth Soccer Association (LWYSA) has soccer fields on 60 acres to the north of our field, we fly on 30 acres to the south with a road in between. All 90 acres is owned by King County and was purchased in 1968 using a voter ratified bond to create parks. The language of this bond is very specific about how these lands will be used and the activities of SASS and other users of our field fit this definition perfectly. About 5 years ago the LWYSA purchased adjacent farm land with full knowledge it could not be developed due to zoning restrictions which prevent farm land in this area to be used for other activities. The LWYSA believed they could through court action rezone the land which they have failed at doing and are now saddled with ~$600k of debt. In secret negotiation between the LWYSA and King County Parks the LWYSA reached an agreement where the county would get ownership of the farm land in exchange for sole ownership of the land that SASS uses. Note that they will own the land, not just be granted use of it. Unbelievably but true, tax payer purchased land will be given to a private organization for exclusive use at its discretion. OK, the county will get the farm land which they in turn plan on giving to a technical college for its agricultural program but this is in clear violation of the bond initiative the acquired the land in the first place. Essentially, its a bail out of the YWYSA, a private organization, by the county at the expense of the current users of the park. A couple of other points to get your blood boiling: SASS allows model rocketry (we sometimes have hundreds of cub scouts come and use the field for big rocketry events), dog racing and walking, kite flying, small electric flying (< Speed 400 power), etc., the LWYSA has signs all over their site that allow one activity SOCCER ONLY. They use their fields about 5-6 months of the year, our site is open to all 365 days of the year. If you have ever flown at our site you will know how unique and wonderful it is, a beautiful combination of thermal flying and some slope lift formed by an adjacent ridge. The site attracts users from all over the greater Seattle area and hosts a number of competitions throughout the year. From spring through the fall, every Wednesday, SASS hosts a beginner night where club gliders are made available and members help novices get started. SASS manages the field in such as way as to be a true public park, where diversity of use is encourage when it does not impact safety. The same cannot be said for our soccer neighbors.
SASS and other groups in the area will be fighting this 'land swap' deal with everything we can manage but it illustrates some points being made in this thread. There is an article in MA this month about how one power club went about purchasing its own field and mentions that the AMA is encouraging clubs to consider going this route. After they got their private field they were able to get a $5k grant from the AMA to make field improvements, perhaps this is the way of the future. Its interesting to note that this club was displaced by soccer fields developed adjacent to their old field (and a new high school building) at which point they were asked to leave.
In the coming weeks and months I am sure others will be posting about our plight, so stay tuned. SASS would appreciate any help that the RCSE community may be able to provide.
At 08:07 PM 11/2/2005, Michael Lachowski wrote:
Wow, you have slope and thermal sites in less than an hours drive. That's pretty good. A better description for NJ is it takes an hour to get anywhere for anything. I will admit I'm lucky in that I do have a field 10 minutes away and I can fly the small stuff out of my back yard.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
How much flying will you be able to get
in when you will have to drive an hour each way to the field or slope? It's going to happen, just a question of time.RCSE-List facilities provided by Model Airplane News. Send "subscribe" and "unsubscribe" requests to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Please note that subscribe and unsubscribe messages must be sent in text only format with MIME turned off. Email sent from web based email such as Hotmail and AOL are generally NOT in text format
Russ Light
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