{"id":13560,"date":"2026-02-12T01:30:22","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T08:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/softball-families-push-cortez-to-address-failing-south-softball-complex\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T21:38:50","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:38:50","slug":"softball-families-push-cortez-to-address-failing-south-softball-complex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/softball-families-push-cortez-to-address-failing-south-softball-complex\/","title":{"rendered":"Softball families push Cortez to address failing South Softball Complex"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The
The South Softball Complex became a point of contention at Tuesday\u2019s City Council meeting in Cortez. (Ann Marie Vanderveen\/The Journal)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

One issue rose to the top of a significant and anticipated agenda during Tuesday\u2019s Cortez City Council meeting: the state of the South Softball Complex.<\/p>\n

Young softball players and their parents sported bright orange Cortez Panthers jerseys and watched diligently as their coaches stood during a public comment period to draw attention to the declining complex, which includes three fields.<\/p>\n

The fields at 24301 County Road G. 2 lack lighting and face several safety concerns, according to residents and the Parks and Recreation Department.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat facility is very important to us,\u201d said Morgan Head, the treasurer for the Montezuma Cortez Softball Association.<\/p>\n

Six teams are registered with the association and 15 teams were registered with the Southwest Colorado Youth Baseball and Softball organization last year, according to Head. Players range in age from 6 to 14.<\/p>\n

\"The
The Panthers play at the South Softball Complex in 2020. (Joel Priest\/The Journal archive)<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cWe have four softball fields to manage all of those teams in this area. If we lose those three fields, that is going to be devastating for both organizations,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

According to Parks and Recreation Director Creighton Wright, the department hired an engineer to assess the electrical system at the complex after the bulbs and ballasts went out and the lighting fixtures fell off their posts. The assessment, Wright told the council, found that the switching gear, on the verge of failing, would likely explode.<\/p>\n

In 2025, the department decommissioned and turned off the electrical system. Wright estimated the cost at around $1.4 million to complete a new electrical service, install new field and parking lot lights and upgrade the electrical capacity for the concession stand and food trucks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to fix that. It all boils down to money,\u201d Wright said. He added that designs are underway for the renovations.<\/p>\n

Members of the softball and baseball communities expressed frustration at the lack of funding provided to them.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need the help. We need it today,\u201d said Chad Pearce, the president of Southwest Colorado Youth Baseball and Softball.<\/p>\n

With Cortez\u2019s crime rate higher than the national average, Pearce and others emphasized the importance of youth sports in providing a safe and structured environment for the city\u2019s children.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s not a lot of summer activities \u2013 baseball, maybe soccer, maybe swim \u2013 but this is a place where the youth can spend time together,\u201d said Simon Martinez, a youth baseball coach. \u201c(The facilities) do need to be maintained and they\u2019re for a good purpose and a good cause for the children in this town.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Wright, who was hired as director at the end of 2021, addressed the council, he called the issue \u201csystemwide,\u201d a sentiment echoed by Mayor Rachel Medina.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do think you\u2019re in an unfortunate circumstance because you haven\u2019t been in the job long. The whole time has been addressing decades of deferred maintenance and everything is in crisis mode,\u201d Medina said to him.<\/p>\n

The softball complex, according to Wright, is one of at least six major issues within the parks system, including problems with the Cortez Municipal Outdoor Pool, irrigation at Parque de Vida and Centennial Park and maintenance on the open space trails at Carpenter Natural Area.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not a singular issue that is targeting an individual group,\u201d Wright said. \u201cThe short answer is we have not maintained our parks and recreation infrastructure for a very long time and we have not as a community come up with a plan of what we\u2019re going to do when stuff starts to fail.\u201d<\/p>\n

This summer, the department plans to create a master plan to determine the priority of needs for parks and recreation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is why the master plan is important for the community to weigh in on what is the priority of all these struggling systems,\u201d Medina said.<\/p>\n

avanderveen@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Parents and coaches urge the city to fix safety hazards and restore lighting as broader parks system issues surface<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13561,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-13560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13560"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19039,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13560\/revisions\/19039"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13560"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=13560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}