Clark College director of athletics Chris Jacob is hearing and listening to the frustrations of softball players and coaches, and vows to take all steps to ensure their safety and well-being.
“It’s not right,” Jacob said, “and we need to fix that as a college and as an athletic department.
“We need to show support,” he continued. “I need to show support for them and we’re going to make things right for them, so they can get back to playing softball.”
A day after Penguins’ softball players and coaches voiced their frustrations of homeless causing ongoing issues of vandalism at their on-campus field, Jacob said Wednesday he, too, is equally frustrated because not only for the same issues, but also for what the softball student-athletes aren’t getting under his direction: A quality experience in the softball program.
Jacob said he planned to meet with the team Wednesday.
“I want to make sure all of our student-athletes and all our students at Clark College have a good experience,” Jacob said … “I feel like I let them down when they don’t have a good experience. This is not an experience that’s enjoyable to them. … It feels like we’re letting them down a little bit. And hopefully, it’s something correctable quickly.”
Jacob and the college acknowledged it’s seen an increase in vandalism around its athletic fields. Since August, 11 of the school’s 26 vandalism incidents are around the area that houses the softball, baseball and soccer fields on the west side of campus, said spokeswoman Hannah Erickson. In response, she said, the college began several initiatives to increase safety measures beginning last fall, including replacing parking lot lighting by the athletic fields and increasing visibility at the softball field by clearing out trees and brushes. The school also is adding a fourth security officer, she said.
Jacob said he plans to meet with the college’s director of security and director of facilities to find additional ways to increase security measures around the field. That includes higher fencing, where currently, some areas of the softball field have fencing as low as 3 feet. This weekend, Jacob said more brush-clearing efforts will happen to increase visibility surrounding the field.
And replacing damaged equipment is taking top priority, too. The team’s batting cage, an estimated value at $5,000 destroyed by vandals, will be replaced soon. The team’s season opener is Feb. 23-24 in the Tri-Cities, and practices are ongoing until then at the field and inside the O’Connell Sports Center.
While the softball complex has taken much of the damage by vandals, Jacob said Clark’s baseball facility — Kindsfather Field — recently had equipment damaged, but it’s unclear, he said, if the incidents are related.
Three of the five college’s athletic facilities — the softball, baseball and soccer fields — sit on 23 acres just off Interstate 5.
Jacob said problems with homeless has been ongoing since his arrival at Clark in 2015, but has escalated this fall. In November, the city opened the Vancouver Navigation Center, a day-use facility for homeless at 2018 Grand Blvd., located less than one mile from the college.
Jacob knows more work needs to be done, and he hopes small steps will in turn lead to big steps.
“We’re moving forward trying to make that area safer,” he said.
