FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM Kainoa Wilson of the Nanakuli-Maili Little League Giants watched the action during an opening-day game at the Nanakuli Beach Park baseball field.

A Little League
field of dreams

Nanakuli and Maili parents and
coaches pitch in to build home turf

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By Lisa Asato
lasato@starbulletin.com

Parents and coaches of Nanakuli and Maili little leaguers turned a grassy field at Nanakuli Beach Park into their very own "field of dreams" just in time for yesterday's season opener.

After waiting more than a year for the City and County of Honolulu to answer requests to put in a baseball diamond, about 10 parents and coaches spent 11 days digging up grass, laying cinder and dirt, mowing the outfield and measuring base lines.

"We decided that the time was running out and kept asking when it was going to be done; basically there was no comment on when," said Gordon Lopes, who is also known as "Coach Maile."

"We figured there wasn't anybody who was going to do anything so we just went ahead and went for it."

Nanakuli Beach Park director Winnie Hanohano said she put in two requests to the city Parks and Recreation Department's Maintenance Support Services to "skin the field and they never came." So when league officials asked if they could do it themselves, she gave them the go ahead.

FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM Nanakuli-Maili Little League players Jonah Ragsdale, left, and Kanai'i Villegas waited in the dugout for their turn to bat yesterday during their opening-day game at the Nanakuli Beach Park baseball field.

"They (fixed) it so they could get their games underway here inside their neighborhood, and I'm behind them 100 percent," Hanohano said.

Hanohano said she learned that the city no longer provides the services because it lacks the manpower and machinery and feels the children can play on grass. Leagues may install the diamonds themselves but are responsible for its upkeep, she said, adding that a volunteer maintains the field at Pililaau Community Park year-round for the Waianae Coast Little League.

City spokeswoman Carol Costa said the city is "doing our best to make sure all fields are consistently playable. We welcome help from leagues, and many do assist the city."

When asked, she said, the city provides cinders or soil "to keep the field in top shape." And "if home plate and the pitcher's mound are not there, all they need to do is ask."

Two city workers installed a pitcher's plate at the field at around 5:30 yesterday morning, a coach said.

Costa said the city spent more than $250,000 installing and constructing dugouts, backstops and a new irrigation system at the field and has aerated the grass twice this year.

The problem was that the previous baseball diamond was not replaced so the players could not hold games in their neighborhood last season. Park construction kept them out the previous year.

"It's been a few years since the community used this park to hold home games. All these years we had to go out and play with other interleague teams and play at the other teams' fields," Kehau Mole. "We just wanted to see the community get together and have the park open up again. We wanted the kids to have their own field."

Cheryl Delos Santos, whose 5-year-old son, Kelvin Simer, took to field for his first Little League game, said having a home field brings the community out together and helps children take pride in the neighborhood. It helps the parents, too.

"We feel proud that we can have (games) in our own city in Nanakuli," she said. "Me and my husband were raised here; this is our park we came to play Pop Warner (football) and cheerleading. So if we raise our children in this park we'll feel proud."

Lopes said his boss let him borrow some heavy equipment and volunteers showed up when they could, working through the evenings after practices. The hard work paid off, he said, adding a reference to the baseball movie "Field of Dreams."

"Fix the park and the kids will come and play. ... This is our 'Field of Dreams.' "