The Jefferson County Little League board held a special hearing Tuesday night with a focus on an open comment session regarding a potential decision for the city of Culver. Parents voiced concerns over a decision made last year to remove Culver from its little league district lines.
“That would also include the communities such as the Three Rivers community, which is going to be across the Cove Palisades, Lake Billy Chinook. It’s also going to be Camp Sherman and a few of those outlying communities as well. So, this is only incorporating 509J school districts. So, it’s not just Culver,” said Jefferson County Little League President William O’Daniel.
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He says the decision stemmed from having the city of Culver specifically have its own team. Culver kids make up 25% of players in Jefferson County, so all those athletes led to a lack of playing time for others on those teams.
O’Daniel also said there was a significant lack of volunteer and business support.
“That was a big basis for our decision,” O’Daniel said. “We couldn’t advocate for them anymore. We couldn’t feel like we were giving them a fair opportunity. So, we gave them the opportunity to come up with their own board and gave them an opportunity to come up with their own league.”
Culver residents could sign a waiver allowing Culver players to play in Jefferson County Little League or surrounding little league organizations such as Crook County and Redmond.
Close to a dozen people came to the meeting to voice their thoughts on the decision.
Even though the board voted back in November to make these changes, it still needs to go to the international little league to review, giving a short amount of time for the board to re-vote Culver into district lines.
“(To) get a better understanding and see if there’s something that we can do. If they don’t charter, if there’s a way that we can reincorporate them back in the Jefferson County Little League and see if that’s something that can be left on the table for our board to make a decision,” said O’Daniel.
The board met in executive session behind closed doors after the meeting. Details of what was discussed in that session are expected to be announced Wednesday.
