LIVERMORE FALLS – Area Youth Sports has asked selectmen if they can use the town’s recreation field for a football field next year. The nonprofit athletic group wants to open dialogue on the idea.

Selectmen said they had no problem with AYS, which serves children in Jay, Livermore Falls, Livermore and Fayette, researching information on setting up a football field and bringing the findings back to the town.

But the board didn’t know how much funding the town would be able to give the project in face of a tax-limiting measure to be voted on in November, tight budgets and the elimination of personal property equipment taxes.

AYS also notified selectmen that the liability insurance cost for 2006 has increased 5 percent and asked for the town’s donation to be increased to $2,467.50 toward buying insurance. Last year, Livermore Falls contributed $2,350 for AYS insurance.

According to the organization’s letter, about 325 Livermore Falls children are in the athletic programs AYS offers to children in grades kindergarten through eight.

AYS President Jim Ouellette wrote in the letter addressing the football field that, “AYS is in need of a football field. Every time it rains, we need to make many phone calls to place our football teams on other fields. The Livermore Falls (Recreation) Field would be a perfect spot for a football field that AYS football could call home for years to come.

“I’m sure I have not found everything we may encounter, but with your help and the support our children’s parents of AYS, I’m sure we can make it …,” he added.

This last year, AYS bought a food concession wagon from the Special Olympics that could be set up on the recreation field with a little work, Ouellette said.

He also listed some of the needs, including a scoreboard – they may ask a soda company to donate that – and removable field goal posts made out of PVC pipe, with the holes covered with sod every year when the season is over.

AYS could buy a machine that sprays paint for field lines, as well as orange vests for chainmen and markers for sidelines.

Water is already at the field, and all that would be needed is a hookup.

They also would need power that perhaps the town could supply, according to the list.

They also hope the towns would provide trash collection with proper cans.

The group would also like to put an 8- by 12-foot storage shed on the field to store equipment.

The letter says AYS would need to come up with a comprehensive plan on how to take care of the field.