Hamden High School is hoping to replace its traditional grass and dirt baseball diamond with a synthetic multipurpose turf field.
"The current field is really borderline unplayable," said James Pascarella, the Hamden Legislative Council President.
With limited space on school grounds, Pascarella said the new multi-sport field, designed by the engineering firm Milone and MacBroom, based in Cheshire, is needed to accommodate multiple teams.
"The good news is that we’ll have a regulation size soccer field, field hockey field and lacrosse field on that field," Pascarella said.
The Hamden Green Dragons football team played its first season on a new synthetic turf field.
"If this second field gets approved they will have eighty thousand ground up tires behind that building," said Nancy Alderman, the president of Environment and Human Health, Inc.
Alderman’s organization of 10 doctors and public health professionals says the rubber tires that go into synthetic turf contain cancer causing carcinogens.
"Do we think at Environmental and Human Health that these students are being put at risk," she said, “without any question.”
"The federal EPA has stated that it is acceptable," Pascarella said in response to health concerns on synthetic turf fields. “There have been private studies that have indicated it isn’t acceptable.”
Student-athlete safety is something the town council considered when approving the synthetic turf field, Pascarella said.
"A deteriorated grass field is prone for significantly higher and more serious physical injuries to the student athlete," Pascarella said.
Hamden’s legislative council has appropriated about $2.5 million to install the new turf field. Now the project needs final approval from the Planning and Zoning Commission.
