Aylesford keeping its diamonds from the rough

BY SARA KEDDY

King County Register

Elaine Marshall says the gals haven’t hit one over the new back line fence – yet.

“Don’t matter where they move that fence,” boasts Doug Hodges.

The two are avid ball players on Aylesford’s fields, and have put time and energy – along with a team of other volunteers and partners – into keeping the field busy and in “the best shape in the Valley.” Doug says.

Sitting behind the Aylesford fire hall, the main field and a smaller backfield are busy at least four nights a week, and most weekends with a string of tournaments organized by the Aylesford Ball Association for its own or community fundraising.

That activity is paying off, Brian Hodges says. Eight teams play men’s softball, and 10 are in the ladies’ league. We’ve got five tournaments booked pretty much every year, plus a few others.”

While ballfields in nearby Morristown, Somerset, Waterville grow grassy from disuse in recent years, Aylesford is a busy ball community.

The local Lions kick in $2,000 a year for field work and programs, the Scouts turn out as ball chasers and barbecuers, the village commission funds the association’s projects and partners on grant applications, summer staff and loans; the county and the province have been successfully approached for money and there are dozens of individuals and businesses pitching with everything from cement for the new fence postholes, chainsaws to clear brush and sod to electrical work for the new lighting – and more.

“Every person in the association has a job – the treasurer, the secretary… but it is the same bunch that does it all the time,” Brain Hodges association president, says.

Still, “we’re out here as soon as we can get on the field in April.”

There have been new members in recent years, and younger players are signing back up – enough this year for two hardball teams.

“I think it’s like anything – it goes in cycles, down and up; and now we’re going up.”

Fifteen years of fieldwork – including close to $60,000 invested in just the past year - is paying off. The lighting on the main field is fantastic, a power pole was moved from the playing area in the back field’s outfield, and the drainage means games go on “when they can’t play anywhere else,” Brian says. The sod in the main field is still greening up after last summer’s pushing back of the lines, from 246 feet to up to 315 feet down the centre.

“We meet with the village every year and decide what we want to do, figure out the price and then we raise it. The village usually gives us three years to pay them back, and we do it in one year.”

That’s between a Scout fundraising tournament that’s been running since 1991 and raising about $2,000 a year, an association commitment to the Kings Mutual Century Centre for a multi-year, $25,000 donation; and tournaments to keep on with the association’s own programs and projects.

There is generally someone at the fields every night tidying, running the canteen, coaching - or, of course, playing.

“Ask my wife where I am!” Doug Hodges says.

On the field

Men’s softball - Mondays & Wednesdays, 7 p.m. & 8:30 p.m.

Women’s softball – Thursdays, 6:30 p.m.

Youth hardball – Mosquito: Tuesdays, 6:30 p.m.; PeeWee: Mondays and Thursdays, 6:30 p.m.