Little League nearly in the dumps

When Rosedale Little League officials arrived at the playing fields in Brookville Park on Friday, June 6, they made an upsetting discovery.
Someone had dumped a mountain of old pallets, smashed plasterboard and odd pieces of lumber next to the little league field off 147th Avenue, just east of 232nd Street.
“It was awful,” said league president Bernadette Brown. “We’ve had people leave a garbage bag or two, but nothing like this.”
Brown explained that at first, they tried and failed to get the Department of Sanitation to clean up the mess, but because the paved area where the refuse was dumped is on park property, it took an appeal to the Parks Department to get action.
“We had to relocate all of our Saturday games,” she said.
The league, which has been in existence for 53 years, provides a sports outlet for between 250 and 350 kids as young as five- or six-years old.
The illegal dumping took place in the lot next to the field where four teams of the youngest players participate in tee-ball games (also known as the “instructional league”).
“There were nails sticking out of some of the pieces,” said vice president Hugh Wilson. “There’s no way you can bring kids that young to an area with that sort of hazard.”
Wilson told The Courier that one of the neighboring residents actually saw the truck that dumped the dangerous rubble in the lot. “She said that they had put black covers over the name on the sides of the truck and covered the license plates,” he said.
“Fortunately, the Parks Department sent [a clean up crew] early Sunday [June 8] and took out… a truckload of debris,” Wilson said. “It took them three hours to get it all,” he added.
The clean-up came just in time. The “All-Star” game for the instructional league was scheduled for Sunday afternoon. “We managed to get in the game,” Wilson said, with relief.
By law, all commercial vehicles must post the name of the company that owns or leases the vehicle, in letters at least four inches high. It is illegal to cover or remove this lettering, and it is also illegal for anyone to cover a license plate. Doing so is reason enough to justify a call to 9-1-1, according to city guidelines.
The maximum penalty for dumping can run as high as $40,000 and the vehicles involved may be impounded. Under certain circumstances, people who report illegal dumping may receive a reward of 50 percent of the amount collected from the violators.
For more information on city programs to combat illegal dumping, call 3-1-1 or visit www.nyc.gov/html/dsny.