Neighbors cry foul, cite ‘inadequate’ baseball backstop

WARREN — For more than four years, neighbors on Common Road across the street from De La Salle Collegiate High School say they have feared going into their yards during baseball season because of flying foul balls, property damage and trespassing strangers.

“For the past 4 1/2 years, I have been unable to use my front yard and or my driveway from spring until the middle of summer, until baseball stops, because of damage,” said George Johnson. “My house gets damaged from foul balls because De La Salle has an inadequate backstop.

“I have to wear a hard hat in my front yard,” Johnson said.

During De La Salle baseball games, Johnson said he parks his car in the school’s parking lot and walks to his home. He has lived on Common for more than four years and has been contending with the foul balls since. According to Johnson, the damage he incurred included a broken rear window. He said shattered glass remains in the insulation of the hatch-back door. The glass can be heard moving back and forth when the door is lifted. The frame around the garage door is dented and the baseballs fit into the dented grooves.

Johnson posted a no trespassing sign after seeing people retrieving balls from his yard.

“We don’t expect people to come on our property, rummaging through our bushes. I’ve even had them up on my front porch and they’re strangers,” Johnson said. “You’re at home in your bedroom and you happen to look out your bedroom window and then there’s someone right below your bedroom window in your bushes.”

Johnson’s neighbor, Nathaniel King, has lived on Common Road for more than 13 years and started to notice damage from the baseballs to his home and vehicles about five or six years ago.

“When they (De La Salle) play it looks like it’s snowing baseballs,” said King.

King has been in contact with De LaSalle —  a private, Catholic college preparatory school for boys — for the past five years and was instructed to only contact Joe Girardi, the school’s director of operations.

King recalls a conversation he had with Girardi.

“As I’m talking to him, balls are flying in the middle of the street as cars are coming by, almost hitting the windshields. They’re flying in other neighbors’ yards. I told him, ‘You’re not taking public safety into account,’” King said.

According to King, he has also experienced property damage from the baseballs. That included a busted windshield, dented vehicles and damage to his home.

“Every year they (De La Salle) always give us different reasons for why they’re not doing anything about it.  It’s always a different excuse,” King said. “At first it was we’re working on it next year. Three years went by, and they still said the same thing.

“Year four, we’re going to move it (the orientation of the baseball field). Year five, he said, ‘The players don’t want it (a suggested overhang over the backstop),’” King said.

Both Johnson and King said the school paid their insurance deductibles for the broken windshields; however, they also said their insurance rates went up because of it.

Johnson said the school has offered him gift cards to go out to dinner.

“I’m not going to do that,” he said. “To me, that’s bribery.”

In a written statement, the De La Salle Communications and Marketing Department wrote that Johnson expressed that he did not feel safe leaving his house while a baseball game was being played, but that he felt it was the only option. Gift cards were offered “to accommodate him and his wife; again, trying anything to be respectful and considerate of the inconvenience in an act of kindness.”

Johnson and King said, according to De La Salle, moving the baseball field would cost upward of $3 million. According to Johnson, De La Salle said they could not go to their board and ask for $10,000 or whatever it costs for a backstop when they’re trying to save that money for the new field.

Residents on Common recently received a letter from the school informing their neighbors that the construction of the school’s science, technology, engineering and mathematics center will start in late June. According to the letter, construction will last approximately a year. This project will add a second story to the current one-story building.  In the letter, the school apologized in advance for any inconvenience from the flow of construction vehicles or noise from the project.

Derek Lutz, a neighbor who had a baseball hit his gasoline powered lawn mower, said, “I’m not trying to spoil anybody’s fun. Baseball is a great sport. I played baseball. And as long as the balls don’t damage my property, I’m fine.

“But if a ball breaks my window or hurts my dog, I’m done with those people,” Lutz said.

The baseball diamond was there when King and Johnson moved into their respective homes.

“I expect to be safe,” King said when asked what he expected when he moved across the street from a baseball diamond.

“Part of the reason I purchased the house was because I didn’t have people living across the street from me, which was very attractive,” Johnson said. “It was attractive that there was a school there, which actually gave us a sense of security because we know they’re keeping an eye on the kids. With that being said, we assumed — and I guess that’s my bad for assuming — that their backstop would be adequate to keep foul balls on their property.”

Some high school baseball backstops have a cantilever overhang, which is added fencing at the top of the backstop that is angled toward the pitcher’s mound to contain foul balls.

“The backstop (at De La Salle) has not been evolving with the subdivision and the equipment,” Johnson said.

Until the baseball diamond changes its orientation, both Johnson and King would like to see a backstop with an overhang installed before next season.

“I know it will not stop 100% of the foul balls but it will stop 90% of them,” Johnson said. “What they have today will stop zero.”

Officials at De La Salle Collegiate High School declined to be interviewed for this story beyond the statements from their Communications and Marketing Department about the complaints from neighbors about baseballs.

“De La Salle strives to be a good neighbor and citizen of the City of Warren and is cognizant of the foul ball complaint by some neighbors living across Common Road. We have been playing baseball games at this diamond since we moved to this property approximately 40 years ago, and this has not been a major issue raised until the last few seasons, when bats became lighter.

“De La Salle has made efforts to eliminate foul balls during practices and has been in communications with the neighbors. Our athletic department always calls the neighbors back when they call the school about a concern.

“De La Salle is actively investigating a solution for next year’s season now that the high school baseball season is over. The best option is to turn the field 180 degrees, with the home plate close to the DLS parking lot. DLS has created a design and is in the process of initiating a capital campaign to raise the millions of dollars necessary to make this happen, but this will not occur by next year. While our goal is to raise the money and break ground as soon as possible, we are willing to work with the neighbors and the City to find an interim solution. The dilemma is we are a non-profit school, and we are trying to make improvements that minimize these foul balls in a manner which improves safety and addresses the neighbor’s complaints, but hopefully avoid making an overwhelmingly expensive financial investment for an improvement that would be destroyed or removed when our new field is built.”