Jefferson Hills: Waivers required to use recreational facilities

By ERIC SEIVERLING

eseiverling@yourmvi.com

Residents and teams hoping to use fields in Jefferson Hills will soon have to sign a waiver to be able to step onto the recreational facilities.

And it’s due to the coronavirus pandemic.

At its meeting last week, council approved a motion requiring all families participating in Thomas Jefferson youth baseball and recreational softball leagues to sign a waiver that releases the borough from any liability should they contract COVID-19.

The motion was introduced by Councilwoman Nicole Ruscitto, who said permits to use fields were given out even before the borough entered into the state’s green phase guidelines.

“We said were going to discuss the green phase for parks before anything was supposed to be done and I don’t think that happened,” Ruscitto said. “From a legal standpoint, with the utilization of our fields comes liability. Heaven forbid, a grandmother who’s raising their grandchild has to supervise and contracts a disease and we can be held accountable for that.”

But to some members of council, the real question is who distributed permits to area teams allowing them to use the fields before the borough was put into the green phase.

“Who made the decision to distribute permits before we met together as a group?” Ruscitto asked.

Councilman Keith Reynolds agreed with Ruscitto’s inquiry.

“I’ve asked that question a couple times,” he said. “It was clear that they were not going to be issued until after we went green. They were, in fact, issued before that.”

“Somewhere along the line, those permits went out before discussing it as a board,” said Councilwoman Vickie Ielase. “Someone took it upon themselves to distribute them without getting an answer.”

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