Group unites for Costa Mesa sports

Marisa O’Neil

Fundraising for an athletic stadium and new swimming pool at the

city’s two high schools began last Thursday night.

Costa Mesa United, a nonprofit group that formed for creating

these facilities, and Costa Mesa Community Athletic Foundation raised

nearly $2,000 in its first official event. Organizers hope that it

generated enough buzz in the city to make people want to help raise

funds to build a new swimming pool at Costa Mesa High School and an

athletic stadium at Estancia High School.

All Newport-Mesa schools share Davidson Field at Newport Harbor

High School, which makes for delicate scheduling issues.

“[Thursday night] was everything we’d hoped for,” said John

Ursini, publicity chair for Costa Mesa United. “We had such a great

mix of people: educators, businesspeople, kids, government officials.

All of them seemed to have that twinkle in their eye and be ready to

get this project done.”

Billed as a “friend-raiser” to pique the community’s interest

rather than actually start collecting donations, a dozen people broke

out their checkbooks anyway after hearing former baseball

commissioner Peter Ueberroth and other speakers talk about the need

for the facilities in Costa Mesa.

Ursini estimated that they need about $7.25 million to build the

facilities, which the two schools would share. The Newport-Mesa

Unified School District has the land available and agreed to take

over operations of both sites once they are built and city recreation

programs would also have access.

Tight state budgets don’t allow for new athletic facilities, said

Dave Brooks, a school board trustee and Costa Mesa United committee

member. And the district’s multischool Measure A improvement bond

does not cover athletic facilities.

The organizations are now working on getting the word out to more

people. Their plan includes a commercial on local cable television.

The proposed multisport stadium at Estancia would seat 2,500

spectators. The 50-meter pool would augment the 25-yard pool at Costa

Mesa High School.