{"id":56706,"date":"2023-01-04T20:41:50","date_gmt":"2023-01-05T01:41:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/?p=56706"},"modified":"2023-01-04T20:41:55","modified_gmt":"2023-01-05T01:41:55","slug":"lehigh-acres-little-league-season-in-jeopardy-due-to-hurricane-damage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/2023\/01\/lehigh-acres-little-league-season-in-jeopardy-due-to-hurricane-damage\/","title":{"rendered":"Lehigh Acres Little League season in jeopardy due to hurricane damage"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Parents in Lehigh Acres are concerned that the little league season will be canceled after some of their field lights were damaged by Hurricane Ian.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The fields may not be ready for the spring season, forcing them to find other options. Right now, the little league fields sit empty, and they may stay that way for a whole season because of the damage Ian did to the fields\u2019 lights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The lights still work, but they failed recent luminosity tests, meaning they\u2019re too dark to safely hold games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cMaybe two weeks ago, they told us that they weren\u2019t gonna be we weren\u2019t going to be able to have a season because of the lights,\u201d said Tina Van Note, Lehigh Acres Little League treasurer and player agent.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Van Note\u2019s kids grew up on the fields, and now that they\u2019ve aged out. She stuck around because she knows what baseball and softball mean to the kids in the area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s so good for the kids, gives the kids something to do instead of playing outside at night on the streets and, you know, keeps them busy,\u201d Van Note said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the issues, Lee County gave the league the go-ahead to sign kids up. Now they\u2019re days away from the start of the season and still can\u2019t play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNow we have 350 kids signed up and no field,\u201d said Van Note. \u201cWe\u2019ve offered as a league to help pay for it to get it done. No avail. We just don\u2019t know what else to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the season supposed to start on January 8, Lehigh Acres players and parents are now hoping for a last-minute miracle.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s so important. We have 350 kids signed up. That keeps kids busy three to four days a week. They\u2019re, you know, they\u2019re at the field. They love it,\u201d said Van Note.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unless something dramatic happens, the kids won\u2019t be able to play this season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lehigh Acres Gazette<\/em> reached out to Lee County for comment. They said, \u201cAll of our parks sustained damage from Hurricane Ian, and we are working closely with federal and state processes to restore our facilities and parks in a way that is the best use of taxpayer dollars.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Parents in Lehigh Acres are concerned that the little league season will be canceled after some of their field lights were damaged by Hurricane Ian. The fields may not be… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":56708,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[2047],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56706"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56706"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56706\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56711,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56706\/revisions\/56711"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}