Wald: Sports fields need to be ‘safe’ for professionals and everyone else – San José Spotlight

All Santa Clara County residents should be proud that one of our own, Edwyn Mendoza, will be playing for the Earthquakes and using this opportunity to advocate for other youth to have “safe fields to play on” in a San José Spotlight opinion piece. Sadly, the “deal” the Earthquakes are forging with the county and San Jose to build soccer fields at the fairgrounds negates safety by insisting that the public areas will be artificial turf.

This issue has been fraught with misinformation promulgated by both the artificial turf industry and sports associations. The science is clear that artificial turf is problematic for numerous reasons:

Artificial turf does not save water. Maintenance manuals specifically call out the need to water fields to clean them and also to cool them. With changing weather patterns consisting of prolonged periods of extreme heat, artificial turf fields will need thousands of gallons of water to cool them off if they are to remain somewhat useable. That cooling effect only lasts 20 minutes or so and will need to be repeated.

Artificial turf fields require potable water as recycled water will degrade them. With many cities and counties turning to recycled water, those fields will not be able to take advantage of this. Plastic turf does not conserve water. Legitimate water conservation entails more than reducing consumption — it critically entails protecting our water sources from microplastic pollution and toxic chemicals.

Field usage has come up by many proponents of artificial turf. Grass fields, when built and managed according to science-based best practices for both sustainability and heavy use, can support the level of usage many local artificial turf fields are getting.

Building sports fields for both professional and personal use is an innovative way to use county land. However, it is unclear why the Earthquakes are so intent to put toxic materials on public playing fields, even to the point of ensuring that they can back out of the fairgrounds deal if Santa Clara County bans artificial turf on Santa Clara County property. This is an unacceptable double standard where the pros get grass and the public, especially children, are playing on toxic, dangerous surfaces.

We can, as a community, do this right by planting sustainable, chemical free, natural surfaces. As the American public is becoming more aware of the health and safety issues associated with artificial turf, communities are considering banning its use on public property. This is not a threat to expanding sports facilities and fields. It is simply ensuring that when we build them, they are, to use Mr. Mendoza’s word, “safe.”

Andrea Wald is co-founder of Community for Natural Play Surfaces.