Montgomery County Council President Gabe Albornoz will introduce legislation on Tuesday that will focus on enhancing youth sports opportunities in the county.
Bill 6-22 will establish an organizing body, the Montgomery County Sports Commission, that will work to identify and address discrepancies in youth sports.
The sports commission will consist of 23 members appointed by the county executive and approved by the county council. The candidates should “reflect the diversity of the county including diversity in race, ethnicity, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, geography and sports represented,” according to a press release.
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Albornoz asked the County’s Office of Legislative Oversight (OLO) to conduct an analysis that examined the sports participation among youth across the entire county. OLO conducted an anonymous online survey where it collected responses from parent-teacher association (PTA) members. The report found that the timing, location, cost and competitiveness of youth sports offerings in Montgomery County are not aligned with the needs of many families. For instance, some parents expressed that sport activities do not take place near the families’ schools or homes and they do not have access to transportation.
Cost also poses a significant barrier for many of the families who took the survey. “Over a third of respondents reported paying over $2,000 annually for one child to play sports,” according to OLO. “Some respondents noted that even the most affordable programs charge over $100 for the season, which is out of reach for many families.”
Albornoz served as the director of the county’s Department of Recreation for 12 years before becoming a council member and he said he saw first hand that there is a missing middle in sports programming. “We have a number of incredible sports clubs and select programs across the county, but not sufficient levels of recreational programs and services particularly in those communities that have been hardest hit from the pandemic, and that are not as economically advantaged as other parts of our community.”
Councilmember Hans Riemer will also join Albornoz on Tuesday to introduce a special appropriation that will correspond to Bill 6-22 and will expand programs for girls in the county– including a $100,000 commitment to the Department of Recreation. A separate analysis conducted by OLO on the sports participation of girls found that the gaps are wider than youth participation as a whole.
“This will allow the Department of Recreation to hire a full-time career staff members with a little bit of a budget to be able to focus exclusively on expanding recreational sports and opportunities that will impact more girls in our communities,” Albornoz said.
