“I live near a paddle tennis court, which is basically tennis but on a small court. And at these courts, I saw this big sign that said, ‘Pickleball players, go home’ or ‘Pickleball was not welcome here.’ And I was like, What is going on? What happened was that pickleball players were sneaking onto the courts when they were open and playing pickleball when this was supposed to be a court for paddle tennis only,” Koebler said. “When I saw that sign, I was like, I bet these people are complaining to the government about the pickleball people.”
It turns out that these people were complaining. A lot. And not just in Koebler’s neighborhood. The city of Dallas told him that it had more than 100,000 emails mentioning the word pickleball. They couldn’t even begin to forward them all. The city of Fort Lauderdale said it would need $10,000 to produce all of its pickleball discourse.
These emails are about who can take up public space, and whether pickleballers are taking up too much of it. And if you’re thinking, Who cares?, Koebler says that the fight over who can take up space in this country—it’s kind of at the heart of the whole American project…
I’m going to generalize here and stereotype. But pickleball players are far more organized than other players of other sports, based on thousands of emails that I read. There are these people in city after city who are “pickleball ambassadors.” And they are given a tool kit from this group called USA Pickleball about how to talk to local government to gain access to more public spaces. And USA Pickleball’s strategy is to try to convince city council or the parks department or your local politician to build new pickleball courts. But because of this NIMBY aspect where homeowners don’t want pickleball in their backyard, it’s really hard to build new pickleball courts in certain places. And so what is happening is pickleball players have to use already-existing public infrastructure. This means basketball courts, hockey courts, tennis courts, of course. And if there’s a permitting system, they’re organized and they make sure to book out all of the permits. If there is not a permitting system, I saw emails where it’s like, I will bring my net for crack of dawn to the tennis court and set up my pickleball net. And then we will play in shifts all day so that we keep the court and the tennis players can’t get on here.
I am not surprised property values are mentioned in this interview. The sound and activity on pickleball courts can be a threat to a quiet residential existence.
I am surprised that taxes did not come up in the conversation. Americans pay property taxes to local government bodies that, among other things, build and maintain parks and public spaces. Homeowners, renters, and businesses contribute these taxes. They can all make requests or demands about how this public space is used. In this case, there is a limited public good – courts where people can play tennis or pickleball or in engage in other activity – and people could claim they are paying to provide space for the activity they want to pursue.
Given how American space is used, is this a zero-sum game: if pickleball players play, does that mean other sports must lose? Can tennis courts and pickleball courts stand side by side and be available to players of each sport? Will private pickleball facilities or clubs help alleviate these issues?
Legally Sociable 