SC Soccer Forums SCSoccer.com Forums Club Soccer & ODP Cainhoy Soccer is suing the Town of Mt. Pleasant

Below is a link to an article in the paper today about Cainhoy Soccer suing the town of Mt. Pleasant due to field space. It appears Cainhoy, in Berkeley County, is not happy that Mt. Pleasant Rec allocates their field space to their own rec department and USA/MP. I thought Cainhoy was building some big complex a couple of years ago.

Is this litigation the reason the PMSL State Cup was moved to the midlands?

http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20...er-field-access

Our organization did indeed start developing a moderately sized complex (6.1 acres) on Cainhoy Road in 2008.
After considerable investment in that land, the owner went belly up. That property under long term land lease was foreclosed on by bank and is currently in the sales process but there are a number of (legal and financial) issues involved here that will unlikely prove favorable to us at this site, although we continue to hold hope.


Since that time of impasse there (2011/12), we have continued to grow and add more fields in other areas of Charleston and mainly Mount Pleasant.
These last two years have seen new soccer fields arrive due to our investment (McAlister Smith, Governors Park back section, and Church of Good Shepherd)

Simply put our growth and demand far exceeds the amount of space we have and our MP membership feel it is unfair to be denied access to public property.
The suit is unfortunately necessary since any appeal or application for access to more space has been denied.
We do not object to any agreements the town enters into with regard to their space, programs, or partnerships but just ask that we (and others) receive same consideration (yes or no).

Of our 887 playing members (children under 18) last year, 674 have MP core zip codes (29464 and 29466).
That's nearly 700 MP children denied access to town space through our registration and we hope to remedy that through this action.

It seems to me that the families of those 700 kids had a decision. They choose to play for a club outside of Mt. Pleasant instead of a club that had a relationship with the town. We'll see what the Court decides.

While at PMSL Cup this past weekend, heard from a very reliable source that out action had nothing to do with the reason to move the event to midlands.

Having said that it is only through our action (intended result), that SCYS or any other entity could host a tournament on town fields.

While on subject of State Cup. Thank you Dennis, Columbia Clubs, and SCYS for an excellent event and a great experience.

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Having said that it is only through our action (intended result), that SCYS or any other entity could host a tournament on town fields.
[/quote]

I'm not sure what you mean by this...

Currently (by agreement) only one organization can host tournaments on MP recreation department fields. The actual wording under current agreement is "MPRD fields will not be available for use by any other soccer club or like entity for soccer tournaments."

However if you want to understand better the reason State Cup was moved, I'd suggest a read of the town's recreation meeting minutes from November 30. Weather and condition related.

http://www.tompsc.com/ArchiveCenter/ViewFile/Item/4057

WOW!!! Interesting developments in MP!

Ok, that's making more sense after reading the minutes. By "SCYS or any other entity could host a tournament on town fields" I'm inferring what you meant was "any other entity BESIDES MPRD and USA/MP," as USA/MP already has permission to host the boys' and girls' Charleston Select Shootout and the Piggly Wiggly tournament.

Just for clarification purposes, SCYS as an entity does not actually "host" the State Cups; member clubs, such as USA/MP, bid to host these SCYS-sanctioned tournaments.

From reading the minutes, it sounds like the host club was awarded the President's Medal Cup before the seasonal year began but for whatever reason didn't request the field usage until November, after October's flooding caused field damage that made MPRD reluctant to commit to further field use beyond the original agreement.

Sounds like a situation that, in terms of USA/MP hosting the SCYS President's Medal Cup, would have been neither exacerbated nor alleviated by the terms of the current lawsuit.

Indeed Coach Chass, your interpretation is largely consistent with what I was told.
You do raise a very good point with regard to hosting State Cup by member clubs.
Your post (rather Chantman's) and potential hosting of a State Cup does help highlight the fundamental grievance some of our members feel with regard to town property.

Using PMSL Presidents Cup as an example. (discounting the fact that it was moved for different reasons)
We saw 64 teams qualify across boys and girls (U15 - U18). That's about 1,000 players with 3-4 games each on public property (reserved for 'private' or reserved use) Swagging ~7,000 hours of individual playing time over two (2) days.Of those teams and players, how many live in Mount Pleasant? One(1) USA/MP team qualified and two(2) Cainhoy Athletic teams for this particular event. So silly example but if we guessed at 50% residency in MP on these three teams, you would be looking at ~25 players with 175 hours total time on the field. A tiny fraction of the overall capacity and all the while the rest of our MP players looking on from the outside never being allowed a single minute, at any point, at any time on fields their parents help fund and support. One full sized field training (fall and spring) would utilize about the same 7,000 hrs. capacity.


I do not use this example to demonstrate how poorly we fared (East of the Cooper) in qualifying for State Cup, rather to help highlight the fundamental equity argument being made in our action. This is not about any objection to hosting State Cups, etc. - Far from it - we love that MP Rec supports soccer so well with wonderful facilities, it is simply asking for equal treatment (yes or no) for our MP players as any other organization (Lacrosse, Football, Ultimate Frisbee, etc.) asking to rent town fields from the recreation department would get (see earlier town recreation minutes from August 3 and a great lacrosse example).

Chantman has a very good question I'm sure the town's attorney will raise (and we have heard before) about individual choice, but to deny that you would then be in an environment without options and that rarely ends well (why antitrust legislation exists). We'll trust the courts (or current council) will make fair and right decisions to explore alternatives that will support the town's charter that includes accessibility to all its constituents. For now the case has been passed to US District (Federal) courts to answer the basic equal treatment question we have asked.

With that, off topic.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to everyone.

To be fair, I don't think the number of teams East of the Cooper that participated the PMSL Cup is reflective of a failure to qualify so much as a product of those clubs not fielding many teams in the U15-18 PMSL division TO qualify. Classic (PMSL) soccer has historically not been the main focus of USA/MP (in its current or previous forms); the majority of their efforts are in the SCSCL. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Cainhoy only fielded two teams in that age range (U16 girls and boys) and both of those teams qualified for the PMSL Cup.

Just to play devil's advocate (I've so missed these "thinking" threads--they seem rare these days!), I took a look at your numbers from what may be the town's point of view to see the perspective you may be up against.

Going with your estimate of about 1000 players participating in the Cup (seems reasonable, as not every team is carrying a full roster of 18), and a guesstimate of about 25 of those players NOT residing in Mt. Pleasant, that would leave approximately 975 out-of-town players spending the majority if not all of their weekend in Mt. Pleasant.

Factoring out the 11 participating teams that were within fairly easy driving distance of the Mt. Pleasant fields (USA/MP, Cainhoy, JIYSC, GPS NASA, SSC, and CUSC), we can roughly estimate around 800 players and their family members who would need lodging for the weekend (typically Friday and Saturday nights). With a very conservative estimate of $100/night for two nights, that's about $160,000 in revenue for Mt. P hotels in two days.

I think it's a fair assumption that those 800 players and their families would be dining in the Mt. Pleasant area during their stay. Figuring an average of 3 family members per player (some will have both parents, some one, some brothers and sisters), I'll figure about 2400 restaurant diners. I think $10/meal is a reasonable average, and figure conservatively one meal Friday night, two Saturday, and one Sunday. That's about $96,000 in revenue for Mt. P-area restaurants in about two days.

Without any thought to additional shopping, gas, side trips, etc. we have about $256,000 in revenue to Mt. Pleasant businesses over the weekend. Based on your estimate of about 7000 person-hours of field use, that comes to approximately $36.57 in local revenue per person-hour of use.

Add this to the fact that having one large club with near-exclusive access to the fields actually makes it easier, not harder, to host major events that would have to make the chamber of commerce happy.

What would the return on investment be on that same 7000 hours on the full-sized practice field you mentioned? Would that usage either bring outside revenue into the town of Mt. Pleasant,or help to keep local revenue within the city?

Add, further, the fact that the town of Mt. P was actually willing to turn down the revenue from the PMSL Cup in order to preserve its fields from further use, and you can definitely see a pattern of thinking that is not geared toward opening the doors to use by additional entities.

Again, Devil's Advocate...when it comes to youth sports, it's not supposed to be about the money; it's supposed to be about what's best for the young people, as they are the most important investment. In reality, though, these are the types of arguments that every organization is faced with. Access to field space has always been a limiting factor for youth sports; it's a big draw for organizations that have access to quality space, and a major challenge for those who do not.