San Dimas council adopts field allocation changes, establishes no-show penalties

San Dimas City Council on Aug. 13 adopted Resolution 2024-61 to revise the city's field allocation policy, shorten the cancellation window for reserved fields and impose a tiered no-show penalty system intended to reduce empty, reserved fields and make more time available to waiting teams.

The action followed public comment from local youth-sports organizers who said proposed fee increases would hurt small nonprofit programs. "Our current attendance rate for residents is 62%," said Bryant Aguilar, president and founder of Spartans Youth Soccer Academy, arguing that higher fees would be "detrimental" to his nonprofit, which subsidizes uniforms and cleats for families that cannot afford them. Javier Hernandez, who runs a nonprofit baseball organization, said the proposed rate increase was "nearly triple" and warned it could push small local teams to join larger, for-profit clubs.

Why it matters: City staff told the council the policy changes target frequent last-minute cancellations and no-shows that leave fields unused despite demand. Recreation Manager Jay Jones said the department manages 14 rentable fields across spring and fall seasons and logged 100 schedule changes and 42 no-shows between February and May 2024, creating many vacant slots during prime hours. "We had 100 changes," Jones said, describing a situation in which fields reserved with lights went unused in the evenings.

What the resolution does: The council adopted a cancellation window reduction from 10 days to 5 days for notifying staff that a reserved field will not be used, and approved a three-strike penalty scheme for organizations: first offense, $30 fine plus a warning; second offense, $60 fine and written notice; third offense, $90 fine and director discretion for penalties up to permit revocation or suspension. Jones told council that fines and enforcement increased communication from user groups during outreach meetings.

Council response and vote: Councilmembers asked staff to separate the field allocation policy and enforcement provisions from any unrelated youth-sports fee increases; staff confirmed the two are separate and that any proposed fee schedule changes will return at a later public hearing. The council voted 4-0 to adopt Resolution 2024-61.

Consent item related to claims: Earlier in the meeting the council pulled Consent Item 3 for discussion after a claim by a resident (identified in the file as Ms. Zang) involving a vehicle damaged by a fallen city tree. Councilmember McConnell questioned staff's recommendation to deny the claim and urged consideration of reimbursing the deductible; staff and the city attorney said the tree had been inspected in 2022 and showed no outward signs of decay, and JPIA recommended denial. The council approved the consent item 3 by a 3-1 vote with McConnell opposing. Councilmembers indicated interest in scheduling a future open-session policy discussion about whether the city should make targeted payments in similar cases.

What's next: Staff said it expects to return for a more detailed study session on the field allocation policy and to present any separate proposed fee changes in a future public hearing.