As the result of Proposition S \u2014 a measure passed by voters in November \u2014 funding now exists for upgrades to Point Loma High School\u2019s (PLHS) Bennie Edens Stadium. The possible list of upgrades includes the potential for stadium lights to illuminate night games and activities \u2014 an idea that residents are taking a dim view of, even in the preliminary stages. “I\u2019d be opposed to having permanent lights,” said Jeanne Mooers, who lives near the entrance to the stadium. “It\u2019s bad enough just one night a year [temporary lights for the homecoming football game and royal court presentation]. But if they maintain the one night a year, I can live with that. If it\u2019s more night games than that, it\u2019s really not very good for the neighborhood.” Despite concerns expressed by neighbors, the stadium upgrades outlined in Proposition S are not a foregone conclusion. Cynthia Reed-Porter, the San Diego Unified School District\u2019s Proposition S communication supervisor, said there is no timeline for completion of the project. “We will be working with the administrators to set up some outreach meetings to work with the community on the overall stadium improvements,” Reed-Porter said. “The project in scope has not been defined as yet.” Reed-Porter said the community would be involved before any decisions on the project were made. “This isn\u2019t a project that\u2019s going to start in the near term,” Reed-Porter said, “so we have time to plan and do the outreach with the community and the parents.” Since 2005, PLHS has hosted one night game per season. This fall, Point Loma will host its homecoming game against Mission Bay under the lights Oct. 16. “Right now, the lights we bring in are a big impact because they\u2019re so noisy because they\u2019re portable,” said PLHS principal Bobbie Samilson. “Permanent ones wouldn\u2019t be noisy, but they certainly would be bright, and people\u2019s houses are right up against the edge.” In addition to the lights and loudspeaker causing a disturbance late into the night, Mooers said the area behind the stadium becomes unsafe after dark. “People will pull up outside of the drive to drop people off for the game and pick them up, so they\u2019ll be double parking,” Mooers said. “Light on the outside is not adequate. I\u2019m surprised there haven\u2019t been more accidents or people hit crossing the street.” Mooers originally moved to her house on Voltaire Street in 1940 and lived there until 1955. She has lived there again since 1981. Mooers attended PLHS and was a graduate of the class of 1950. “Voltaire is not the widest of streets, so it does present a problem with traffic,” Mooers said. “If you wanted to back out of the driveway or go into it, people are walking up and down the streets.” Samilson said Proposition S proj-ects are still in the planning phase and that there are no definite plans for construction \u2014 including stadium lighting \u2014 in the future. “Before any school would do that,” Samilson said, “there would be a community outreach and we\u2019d get community input into the proj-ect.” Neighbors of the PLHS stadium have also had a growing concern with the conduct of groups that rent the stadium for miscellaneous activites. On July 14, Samilson and PLHS vice principal Kevin Gormly met with 15 neighbors of the school to discuss the lights and issues regarding stewardship of outside parties who use the stadium. “When people rent [facilities] through the district or through the school there are expectations, but they haven\u2019t been met, and we\u2019re going to write a better outline of expectations so there\u2019s less of an impact on the neighborhood,” Samilson said. Gormly made note of eight items to help mitigate impacts on neighbors. Such items include the creation of contracts to hold outside groups accountable to behavioral rules, making a sign as a reminder of common courtesy\/good neighbor guidelines for placement at the Voltaire Street stadium entrance, having campus police monitor parking around the stadium and redirecting stadium speakers to face more downward. The school also plans to e-mail Proposition S information to neighbors, including community outreach meeting dates and times. “We want to be good neighbors to them and allow them [outside organizations and groups] access to the field, but we have to have stricter guidelines to make sure the different groups that come don\u2019t park in people\u2019s driveways and don\u2019t leave trash,” Samilson said. “We want to meet with them more regularly and make sure that things are done correctly so that it doesn\u2019t impact the neighbors.” For more about Proposition S, visit www.sandi.net\/props. There will be an update on Proposition S projects at the SDUSD board of education meeting July 28.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As the result of Proposition S \u2014 a measure passed by voters in November \u2014 funding now exists for upgrades to Point Loma High School\u2019s (PLHS) Bennie Edens Stadium. The possible list of upgrades includes the potential for stadium lights to illuminate night games and activities \u2014 an idea that residents are taking a dim […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11561","_seopress_titles_title":"Neighbors take a dim view of PLHS stadium lights idea","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11551,11593,11561,11550],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-299803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-no-images","category-peninsula-beacon","category-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299803\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}