GUILDERLAND — Guilderland will soon have a box lacrosse field at the town’s DiCaprio Park.

At its Nov. 19 meeting, the town board approved releasing $75,000 from the Parkland Assessment Fund to reach the $300,000 needed to build the facility.

At the same meeting, Christine Duffy, a Guilderland resident and persistent advocate for people with disabilities, spoke against the expenditure, saying the board should instead spend funds so disabled children could play in the town parks.

Prodded by Duffy, two of the board’s five members spoke in favor of providing equipment, in the future, for handicapped children in the town’s parks.

In August, Guilderland Youth Lacrosse had received $200,000 in American Rescue Plan Act funds, through Albany County, for the box lacrosse field.

Doug Breakell, president of the board of directors for Youth Lacrosse, told The Enterprise at the time that the not-for-profit organization had been fundraising for six years to build a box lacrosse field, and still needed to raise about $150,000.

A Nov. 4 memo to the town board members from Colin J. Gallup, director of Parks and Recreation for the town, said the $75,000 would be added to the ARPA funds and the money raised by Youth Lacrosse to meet the estimated $300,000 cost.

He said that the synthetic turf field, bounded by boards on the sides, would measure 184 by 84 feet and be located near the east end of the park’s pavilion.

While lacrosse has only become popular with American youth in the last several decades, it has a centuries-long history in North America.

European settlers first saw the game being played by Native Americans in the 1600s. Canadians in the 1920s developed box lacrosse, which is played in hockey rinks there — without the ice.

Breakell explained that the box lacrosse game involves smaller teams in less space.

“It’s a shorter field with quicker movements; it hones young kids’ skills for passing, catching, and footwork,” he said. 

It also has practical advantages. If there is snow on the field in May, kids will still be able to play, he said. “And little kids won’t lose the ball in the woods.”

Several other local places already have box lacrosse, he said, naming Saratoga, Niskayuna, and Shaker.

Guilderland Youth Lacrosse has both a spring program, with about 400 players, and a fall program, when soccer and field hockey also draw players, with about half that number. The coaches — all volunteers — number about 40 in the spring and 20 in the fall.

Any child in kindergarten through sixth grade is invited to participate. “We have equipment so you can try it,” said Breakell.

He spoke of how valuable the sport is not just physically but socially and emotionally for kids.

“We want these kids to get to know each other, sharing a game they love,” he said. “We want more kids playing.”

Gallup wrote in his memo that eventually the box facility could be used as an ice rink in the winter but that would require power, piping, and refrigeration as well as equipment to maintain the ice. “At present, it is too costly to add this option,” Gallup said, “but the design will allow for this winter use.”

He also said that the box facility can be used for both field hockey and soccer as well as lacrosse. “Current participation in the three sports,” he wrote, “includes 500 families in soccer, 450 families in lacrosse, and 150 families in field hockey, one of the fastest growing girls’ sports in the area.”

“There’s been a lot of movement to try to include and increase our opportunities here for our recreational sports for children throughout town,” said Councilman Jacob Crawford at the Nov. 19 meeting, “and DiCaprio Park is already considered a crown jewel of the Capital District park system.”

Plea for accessibility

Christine Duffy told the board, “I’m disabled and I was able to get my butt to this podium tonight but disabled children, they don’t have that opportunity.”

Duffy dominated public discourse throughout the meeting, speaking on a wide range of topics without being silenced or kept to time constraints by the board. She complained that the zoning board did not require street addresses for applicants, that recordings of meetings had been edited, that public sidewalks are blocked, and that Supervisor Peter Barber was not worthy of representing Guilderland at the upcoming Association of Towns meeting, among other allegations.

But her comments on accessibility in town parks resonated with at least two board members.

“Our priorities are out of whack here ….,” Duffy told the board of releasing $75,000 for the box facility. “We don’t have enough opportunities for children with disabilities to be in our public parks. And morally, this town board should be ashamed of themselves for their conduct ….”

Duffy recommended that the $75,000 should instead be spent on “an actual swing in any park for children with disabilities.”

Councilwoman Amanda Beedle said she had looked into getting a sensory-friendly playground for children who are on the autism spectrum.

“I work at Capital Region BOCES,” Beedle said, “and I understand the importance of these children having the same inclusive access to our playgrounds as the able-bodied children.”

It is a priority for her, said Beedle, concluding of Duffy’s comments, “So I kind of take offense to that.”

“I take offense to your priority timeline,” Duffy responded. “Had I been in your shoes, I would have remedied that right away.”

Duffy went on, “Now your vote is needed not to go forward on this. I suspect you will go forward and authorize this,” she said of the $75,000 for the box facility. “But I want to make you aware that it’s morally wrong.”

At this point, Deputy Supervisor Christine Napierski interjected, “I will just say for the record, I think you are right. And I appreciated your letter to the editor in The Altamont Enterprise, and I brought that up to the supervisor at our budget meetings.”

Duffy is a frequent Enterprise letter writer.

Napierski went on, “I think we need to have handicapped-accessible playground equipment in every playground in every park.”

Ultimately, the board voted unanimously to release the $75,000 for the box field.

“I’m in favor,” said Napierski as she cast her vote, “but I hope that we can do a better job.”

She cited the need to secure state funds and concluded, “I think you are right, Ms. Duffy. All children should be able to play in our parks with their friends and their families. And all our parks should be handicapped accessible and have handicapped equipment that all children can use.”

Other business

In other business at its Nov. 19 meeting, the Guilderland Town Board:

— Declared itself the lead agency in coordinating review of the recommendations for updating the town’s comprehensive plan under the State Environmental Quality Review Act and directed the planning department to coordinate the review that will go to at least 14 local and state agencies.

Both votes were unanimous and taken without discussion.

A committee had worked with a consultant for two years to make recommendations on updating Guilderland’s two-decades-old comprehensive plan;

— Designated Barber as Guilderland’s representative at the annual business session of the Association of Towns, which will be held on Feb. 18;

— Approved new fees for the transfer station: Demolition debris will cost $150 per ton, up from $140, and residents, except for senior citizens, will be charged $8 instead of $7 for each trip with garbage. The rate for seniors remains at $6 per trip.

“This is my least favorite thing to do, the price increase,” David Corey, superintendent of the transfer station, told the board. “I take this all to heart.”

He went on, “I want to leave the senior price alone. The majority of our customers are seniors; they bring the least amount.”

Corey said he was forced to raise the residential rate because “we’re running about $5,000 short there ,and that should cover that within a year’s time.” The deficit was caused by increases in price for the disposal of garbage at the Colonie landfill, Corey said.

The town of Colonie used to own the landfill and kept prices steady, Corey said, but now it’s privately owned, and he said, “I’ll get four rate increases a year from these guys now.”

The $10-per-ton hike for demolition fees likewise should cover the $30,000 “in the hole” within a year’s time, said Corey

He said the goal is not to make a profit but, rather, to have the transfer station be self-sustaining;

— Scheduled a public hearing for Dec. 10 at 7:15 p.m. on a local law amending the town code on sewer costs and liability as requested by the superintendent of Water and Wastewater Management.

The town’s sewer system is paid for by fees charged to property owners in the sewer district. The proposed local law says that the town needs to develop a capital fund that can be used for the replacement of equipment and any necessary expansions. 

“To allocate equitably such costs to the new and expanded users,” the bill says, “this section imposes a fee on new connection and expansion of existing connections that approximates the cost to the sewer district”;

— Scheduled a public hearing for 7:30 p.m. also on Dec. 10 on a local law amending the town code on fees as requested by various department heads; and

— Scheduled its 2025 reorganizational meeting for Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025 at 7 p.m. at Town Hall.