South Bay Schools, Neighborhoods At Odds Over Stadium Lights Proposal
MOUNTAIN VIEW (KPIX 5) -- Two South Bay high schools and local residents are at loggerheads over a proposal to install lights for night games and practices. Mountain View High and Los Altos High are the only two high schools in the South Bay that do not have stadium lights.
Currently, the sports teams practice only as long as there's daylight. During the spring and fall, this condition is workable, but come wintertime, many sports programs - football, soccer, lacrosse, field hockey, and even the school band - literally get left in the dark. Especially with a booming increase in student population for the two schools over the past few years, more people in these programs have been pushing for the stadium lights.
"There's more sports, there's more activity going on. And really, we've run out of space. There's nowhere to go," said Brett Schiller of the Mountain View High School Sports Boosters. "Being able to get more access and use of the stadium, even for a few hours a day, is a big deal now."
Jeff Harding, the superintendent for Mountain View-Los Altos High School District, is a mediator in the ongoing debate. He said there was a three-hour school board meeting to discuss the issue last week, but a main point of contention was that the schools are nestled tigthly in neighborhoods, with many homes in close proximity to the fields.
"What I'm interested in each group understanding is each other's point of view," Harding said.
Rosemary Harden, a resident who has lived two hundred yards from Los Altos High School for 38 years, has seen the use of the field rise dramatically.
"Things have changed a great deal," said Wadden. She said she's had to deal with students speeding and parking in the neighborhood.
She also said that living with the sound from the PA announcer has been a nightmare. "It started getting oppressive. It was no longer pleasant background noise; it was obnoxious noise," said Wadden.
By law, the schools do not have to get permission from anyone to install the lights, but Harding wants to maintain the good relationship that the schools have with their neighbors.
"Well, this is a tight-knit community. We're in this together, with our neighbors. It's a symbiotic relationship we have with our neighbors, and we want to keep it that way," said Harding.
It is early in the process, but the schools are looking at directional LED-style lights that would reduce light spillage into the surrounding neighborhoods.There was also discussion of limiting the use of the PA system.
The school board meeting last week marked the beginning of a year-long process. The next steps for the school district are to form a task force, gather some members from the community, and attempt to study the issue by collecting some concrete data; from there, they will try to find some middle ground between the schools and the residents of the surrounding neighborhoods.
