I’ll stack my record of defending and championing the city of Lewiston against anyone’s.

While too many in Maine perpetuate insipid memes involving “The Lion King” or President Trump flyovers, or dog-tired nicknames for the downtown area, I’ve done everything in my power to focus on what is being done well.

Now, when your job for more than a quarter century was keeping all four eyes on the Blue Devils’ sports fortunes, it isn’t hard to achieve that level of goodwill.

But the proof hangs in the high school’s hallowed halls. People one-third my age now have vivid memories of LHS winning state titles in boys’ soccer, boys’ and girls’ hockey, boys’ and girls’ tennis, cheering and track and field, plus getting to state or regional finals in baseball, football and boys’ lacrosse. That’s all happened since 2010, and thanks to the inherent danger and my own horrid history with list-making, I’m sure that I’ve forgotten at least one obvious sport and apologize profusely in advance for it.

Lewiston is a special place with a huge heart and a knack for developing great student-athletes, plus furnishing whatever it takes to help them succeed.

Having made that abundantly clear to anyone who will listen for as long as I’ve collected a paycheck in this business, I’ve earned the leeway to ask a simple question.

Why in the actual hell are you holding the neighborhood’s American Legion baseball outfit hostage to use your new, artificial turf facility?

My friend and colleague Adam Robinson did an outstanding job digging up the answers in his story last week, but I’m afraid labeling them answers affords city hall too much credibility.

Despite their convenient location around the high school campus, LHS’ vastly improved athletic fields are run by the city and fall under the auspices of its parks and recreation department.

Far be it from government – and yes, the trend is now particularly pervasive all over my native state – to grab revenue at every turn from the blistered, trembling fingers of its populace.

According to Pastime Club coach Chris Reed, who served as an assistant with the LHS varsity in the spring, his team would have been asked to pay exorbitant fees ($85 per hour for usage, $50 clean-up, $35 supervisory) that dwarf the pittance high school players and recent graduates pay to participate in the time-honored league.

This is consistent, on the surface, with the bill footed by out-of-town high school teams to use the field during the foul weather of early spring, and by summer AAU teams that profit heavily from year-round athletes’ hope of playing baseball in college.

It’s also said to be patterned after the price menu Portland assesses to use fields within its jurisdiction.

There are multiple problems in trying to apply this policy without prejudice, not the least of which is the make-up of the Pastime roster. All but four players wore Lewiston blue, white and gray during the high school season. So a majority of the participants come from homes that are heavily invested in the city’s school and athletic infrastructure through property tax revenues and the like.

More faulty logic is the head-scratching obsession with being like Portland. You’re not Portland, and by every law of geography and economics, you won’t be for the foreseeable future.

Lewiston has one high school. Portland still holds three, even after the dissolution of McAuley/Maine Girls Academy. The southern hub city’s median family income is only incrementally higher, but that doesn’t account for the wall of affluent, bedroom communities that feed into the place.

You live in a different world, and it’s one where the kids sorely need positive entertainment alternatives that don’t involve a PlayStation 4, an iPhone, or worst of all, just “hanging out.”

Baseball is by its definition a pastime, and one that probably prepares its practitioners to handle failure in an era that tries to gloss it over. It’s dying on the vine in many parts of Maine, at least partially because of those dated quirks in its personality, but also due to situations such as this one becoming too much the rule.

“Profits” in any small-to-medium-sized municipality shouldn’t be measured merely by dollars and cents. Producing a confident, fit generation and giving it a reason to take pride in that community and call it home for a lifetime is equally crucial.

Of course, that requires forward thinking in an era when we’re all obsessed with the moment and bent on survival, which is also why it’s like pulling teeth to get new school constructions and/or budgets approved.

Thankfully for Pastime Club, other good neighbors – Pettengill Park in Auburn, and the Elliot Little League complex – kindly furnished places to play out the home segment of an already cramped schedule.

That’s a search that never should have happened, on top of a negotiation that should have been a foregone conclusion. Keep in mind that Pastime used the field for eons when it was made of grass.

It also means that a crisp, clean, multi-use facility – one I’m certain kids were used as a prop to convince the community of the need for it – sits mostly dormant during the nicest months of the year while those same kids settle for less.

Hitting a round ball with a round bat squarely is hard, but a compromise here shouldn’t be.

Be excellent. Be Lewiston. Let the kids play.

Kalle Oakes spent 27 years in the Sun Journal sports department. He is now sports editor of the Georgetown (Kentucky) News-Graphic. Kepe in touch with him by email at kaloakes1972@yahoo.com or on Twitter @oaksie72.

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