HoCo Cricket Fans Want New Pitches, County Responds

ELLICOTT CITY, MD — Requests made by Howard County parents seeking new cricket pitches was originally denied by school officials and some believe it's racially motivated. According to the Maryland Youth Cricket Association, Howard County has one of the largest and fastest-growing populations of families with roots in cricket-playing South Asian nations such as India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

"For these families, seeing their children play cricket with the Howard Community Youth Cricket Board maintains an important cultural connection and the refusal of (Howard County Public School System) to allow facilities to be built for them makes us wonder how this should be interpreted by the South Asian community in the county," the association posted in a blog on its website.

Jamie Harrison, chairman of the Maryland Youth Cricket Association, told Patch that of the three existing cricket pitches, two are for adults and only one is designated for children and there are an estimated 200 children in Howard County's youth cricket program.

"Imagine having 200 kids in one baseball program sharing one field. It isn't plausible," Harrison said.

Patrick McGinnis with the Howard County Recreation & Parks Department told Patch that he has been working closely with local families involved in cricket for the past five years and that the Maryland Youth Cricket Association does not work directly with Howard County.

Harrison said that Howard County parents approached him for help after pleas for additional pitches to the local school district were not heard.

"The parents offered to pay for it themselves, to have the pitches built, but they were informed by the schools that there was a broken storm drain on the field that made it dangerous for kids to be there. They offered to pay to fix the storm drain and were told no, that the school district issued a memorandum not allowing cricket pitches on school property," Harrison said.

Harrison said he is a part-time cricket coach and his team uses a cricket pitch at a school.

"The teachers tell me they love having it, because it's used for kickball and other activities. There are schools all over Maryland with cricket pitches, but we were told that no more would be built on school property," Harrison said

Brian Bassett, senior communication strategist with the Howard County Public School System, said a youth-sized pitch exists at Faulkner Ridge Center. Regarding the possible construction of future pitches, Bassett said that "nothing has been decided at this point."

McGinnis said that to accommodate the growing demand for cricket pitches and as a way to continue to develop local youth cricket programs, Howard County Parks & Recreation and Howard County Public Schools System has rolled out plans to build two new pitches.

"Howard County Recreation & Parks has two new cricket pitches currently passing through our bureau of capital projects. One will occupy an open area at Lake Elkhorn Middle School and the other will be an expansion of our current cricket grounds at Schooley Mill Park," McGinnis told Patch. "Both new pitches have a projected completion date of spring 2020. With these new pitches, HCRP will provide five premier pitches for our youth and adult cricket community."

McGinnis said that Howard County is very lucky to have a strong and growing cricket program.

"Howard County Recreation & Parks currently host youth and adult cricket programs at our Schooley Mill Park field and our Murray Hill Middle School field. These two cricket pitches are considered to be the best grounds in the mid-Atlantic area and attract players and families from the entire region. In fact, Howard County is excited to announce two national tournaments that will be bringing cricket families to our area from all over the country in July of 2020," McGinnis said.