The Neverending Story

Damn it I wrote another one about pickleball.

Greetings Readers!

So — I’ve declared a few stories to be my final words on pickleball.

And yet, I spent the evening of December 17th in the company of passionate pickleballers, a handful of dejected Ojai City Hall neighbors, and the newly reconstituted Ojai City Council. The occasion? A special Ojai City Council meeting on the topic of pickleball. (By my count, it’s the third in two years.)

Tuesday evening in City Council Chambers.

At this point, this saga feels circular. Or is it a spiral? I’m not sure if we’re spiraling up or down. I suppose that depends on your perspective. Regardless, I doubt I’m the only individual who is tired of swirling in this particular tornado.

Some may suggest that I just… stop writing about pickleball. But… I’m compulsive. Whatever. Let’s get into it.

On the morning of December 11th, former Ojai City Public Information Officer Kristy Rivera (current Interim Recreation Manager) announced the passage of Measure O (The Ojai Pickleball Act) via press release. But that wasn’t the news. This sentence was:

“The City Hall pickleball courts will operate from dawn to dusk per Ojai Municipal Code § 4-3.508.”

Notably the aforementioned section of the Municipal Code contains no mention of dawn, dusk, or any hours in particular. (It also says the Parks and Recreation Commision — which hasn’t met in over a year — is responsible for setting park hours. We’ll get into that later)

The aforementioned section of Ojai’s Municipal Code. Via City of Ojai. I also note that the Code assumes the City Manager is a man.

The City’s prior language about the court hours — if Measure O were to pass — was varied and inconsistent. A June 11th City Staff report on the potential impacts of Measure O stated, if approved, “pickleball play time would stay the same.” The same as what?!

Via City of Ojai

The June report was authored by City Manager Ben Harvey, City Attorney Matthew Summers, and Deputy City Clerk Weston Montgomery.

At that time, the City Hall pickleball courts were still open, but operating on severely restricted hours that disallowed play on Saturday, Sunday morning, and Monday. These hours remained in effect — the so-called “pickleball compromise” —until the Soule Park courts opened in September, at which point, the City Hall courts closed. Got it?!

Let this be a lesson to us all: don’t call something a compromise unless all parties are onboard with said compromise. Via City of Ojai.

The City’s language on the matter of pickleball play hours evolved over the summer months. In a City-generated Frequently Asked Questions document about Measure O — finalized August 2nd and still live on the City of Ojai’s website — we see a radically different understanding of play hours under Measure O. It reads, “If the initiative passes, the City anticipates the City Hall pickleball court would be open the same hours as the City’s other parks.” The city’s other parks are generally open from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.¹

Via City of Ojai.

So — one could arrive at wildly different conclusions regarding the potential impact of Measure O, depending on which City documents one read. Problematic, indeed.

Ojai Valley News reporter Kimberly Rivers attempted to get clarity on the issue in late September, she recently reported. The response Rivers reportedly received from Assistant City Manager Carl Alameda indicates that the City wasn’t sure what would happen if Measure O were to pass.

Image via Ojai Valley News.

And then… O passed!

Via Ventura County Clerk & Recorder.

Shortly after Rivera’s “dusk through dawn” press release, the City made another announcement: a special meeting on pickleball was coming to City Council chambers on December 17th, just three days before the courts are legally mandated to reopen on Friday, December 20th.

We later learned that the meeting was requested by Councilman Andy Whitman (who has consistently advocated for the noise-averse neighbors) and newly sworn in Councilwoman Kim Mang (who represents the City Hall neighbors).

Once the meeting kicked off, Harvey revealed he was stuck in a political pickle of his own:

“One challenge that we face as a City is the [Ojai Pickleball Act/Measure O] is silent as to what the hours for the pickleball court shall be. I wrestled with this topic quite a bit, scouring through the Ojai Municipal Code, and policies and procedures… but ultimately you as City Council have the authority to make that determination,” he said.

The text of Measure O. Note the lack of specificity. Via City of Ojai.

The Municipal Code is a bit confusing on the matter of public park hours, Harvey explained. “This is the problem with the code. It’s a little unclear. And if you don’t like one provision you can go find another provision that contradicts what you just found.” Summers chimed in, “In total, the code is 500 pages written over 100 years. So, it’s not consistent.”

(I love this observation very much — the idea of our laws as a sometimes contradictory story written over generations. Sounds very human to me.)

Anyways — Harvey suggested that the Council begin its discussion using the last set of approved pickleball court hours (the purported “compromise” hours) which Councilwoman Leslie Rule identified as the “most restrictive period ever” on the pickleball courts prior to closure.

Harvey noted that public park hours, according to the Code, technically fall under the purview of the (currently inactive) Parks and Recreation Commission. However, all Commission decisions are appealable to the Council. Meaning, according to Harvey (and Summers), that the Council retains the power to set park hours.

Not so according to Brad Hertz, an attorney hired by the pickleballers. He argued in a letter that the Council “is without the power to micromanage the implementation of Measure O.”

Hertz beamed into the meeting via Zoom:

“Simply put, Measure O, the Ojai Pickleball Act, is now the law of the land in the City of Ojai. The City is legally obligated to implement the measure, not to undermine [it],” Hertz argued on behalf of the pickleballers. “The only legally proper course of action for the City, at this juncture, is to open the City Hall pickleball courts from dawn to dusk beginning this Friday, [December] 20th… What the City cannot legally do is narrowly interpret the Measure as if it were never voted on, disregarding the will of the voters. Doing so will lead to a lawsuit against the City.”

The vast majority of public comments came from the pickleballers, who were incensed at the suggestion that they should return to restricted hours of play after winning the election.