After years of having our vehicles and property damaged by adult ball players, who consider it a "home run" to hit our homes or cars, I am requesting that the baseball field at Shawnee Park in Dunbar, WV be restructured and moved.
The players when "batting" are facing the homes in the area, when there is a large open field straight in front of the field. If those "batting" were with their backs to the main road and the homes, they could hit the ball straight down the field with no worry.
As you can see by the photo, the field faces the heavily traveled King Street. There are several trucking companies as well as WV Paving that travels this road everyday. How long before one of the balls hits one of these trucks and it crashes?
When the park was owned by the county, my grandparents lived in the home I've purchased and they had the same problems. The county put up a fence and would only let teams use limited flight balls. This corrected the problem for a little while.
Now that the city of Dunbar has taken over the park, it is starting again and 10 times worse than it used to be when I was a kid. There are no regulations on the field now.
When a window is broken, the Parks and Recreation tell you to call the Dunbar Police Department. The Dunbar Police Department say they cannot respond because the ball left city property. The Kanawha County Sheriff's will respond, but only to get the names and numbers of the person or persons responsible for the damage. You are told to call the city back. You do and you hear "the Mayor will call you back no later than tomorrow." Three days later I'm still waiting.
