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STAMFORD, Conn. Chris Sabia was happy Stamford Legion baseball won on Wednesday, but the pile of two-by-fours and lumber by his feet was visibly frustrating him. Sabia, the director of the Stamford American Legion baseball program, has repeatedly contacted city officials about the state of the dugouts at Westhill High School.
"The first impression as you come here is not great. It's just sloppy," Sabia said. "We had people from Norwalk tonight and the field is not in great shape. I don't know why it's taken so long."
As reported by The Daily Stamford back in April and in an opinion piece by Doug Horn, the progress in renovating Westhill's ailing baseball field has been by inches. Almost three months after those articles were written, the dugouts are still far from completion.
The Westhill field was unplayable for the first half of the high school season. The Vikings were forced to play most of their home games at Cubeta Stadium. With Cubeta in such high demand for local baseball teams during the summer, facilities like Westhill become important to Stamford teams trying to complete their schedule.
"We get as many games as possible for our older kids at Cubeta, but our 14 and 15-year-old teams predominantly use Westhill as a home field," Sabia said. "There has been progress here, but it has been slow progress to say the least."
As reported in the earlier article, the project was originally slated to cost $100,000 to complete, but the city allotted just $25,000. The city said that money had to be used to renovate classrooms before getting to the field.
Now that the school year is over, Sabia is still waitingand losing patience.
"We've been told different things from the beginning. It was April 15, then it was May 15. I've kind of stopped asking to be honest," Sabia said. "Michelle O'Brien at the Board of Education facilities [office] has been a great help, but I just feel bad to keep calling and asking."
Are you surprised the Westhill dugouts are still unfinished? Start the discussion below!
Do you have information on the progress of the Westhill dugouts? Contact sports reporter Eric Gendron or town reporter Anthony Buzzeo.
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