Trinity College wants to use artificial turf on some of its athletic fields, but the City of Hartford has pushed back, and now the two are in state court.
The college needed the city’s approval to remake its baseball, soccer and softball fields. It wanted to add new bleachers, a press box, and dugouts. It also wanted to covert the college’s natural grass playing surfaces to synthetic turf. College officials told the commission that it would make the fields more playable and give them better drainage.
But according to a suit the college filed in state court, while the city’s Planning and Zoning Commission voted to approve the rehab, it did so with one big condition: Trinity could only use natural grass.
According to the suit, three of the commission’s five members had concerns about the possible health effects of synthetic turf, despite the fact that artificial turf fields are widely used. The suit says that the city has recently installed artificial turf at several of its public schools.
One of the three commissioners who opposed the synthetic turf was Sara Bronin, the Planning and Zoning Commission chair, and wife of Democratic mayoral candidate Luke Bronin. The minutes of the meeting show that she had concerns about the environmental effects of the turf. She pointed to a 2010 state study of artificial turf that said “health risks are not elevated from playing on the fields,” but it also noted that there could be problems associated with storm water runoff.
Trinity filed its suit back in May, calling the action illegal, arbitrary, and an abuse of discretion. The suit says the commission “acted in an area of technical complexity require expertise that they did not posses.”
The complaint is still pending. The city declined to comment. Trinity confirmed the suit is pending but would say nothing further.
