LIHU‘E — Some island soccer players and coaches were screaming “foul” when they were denied use of the manicured football field inside Vidinha Stadium here for their league games. Adding fuel to the fire was a rumor that the field
LIHU‘E — Some island soccer players and coaches were screaming “foul” when they were denied use of the manicured football field inside Vidinha Stadium here for their league games.
Adding fuel to the fire was a rumor that the field was declared off-limits to men’s (Sunday afternoon and evening), coed (Tuesday night) and youth (Sunday afternoon) soccer-league participants to give the turf time to rest in anticipation of the April 10 University of Hawai‘i-Manoa football Green and White scrimmage.
But the UH scrimmage had nothing to do with a decision to temporarily ban soccer games from the field, said Lenny Rapozo, director of the county Department of Parks and Recreation.
“Extensive work needs to be done to improve the quality of the turf at Vidinha Stadium,” he said.
“Our plan is to continue with this work until football season opens,” he said of the fall Kaua‘i Interscholastic Federation boys season.
In 2009, the KIF preseason schedule began in mid-August.
Frequent stadium visitors and those passing by have routinely seen sprinklers in use during daylight hours in order to accomplish the turf-improvement plan.
The KIF track and field teams use the track and a portion of the infield to practice for field events including the long jump and triple jump, but don’t normally use the football-field portion of the stadium.
There are two more KIF track and field meets planned at the stadium before the season’s end.
“The Department of Parks and Recreation would consider use of the stadium for a special event during this period, however, regular (soccer) league games and practices will need to be scheduled elsewhere,” Rapozo said via e-mail forwarded to the newspaper by Beth Tokioka, executive assistant to Mayor Bernard P. Carvalho Jr.
