Soccer is more popular every year in Tracy, but new teams have also found that the city’s offering of soccer fields can’t meet their needs.

Coaches from the three-year-old Tracy Futbol Club had enough last week. As teams prepared for weekend tournaments, they discovered that the lighted fields at Tracy Sports Complex were not available for their practice.

Adding to the frustration was the sight of a sport complex lit up by the bank of flood lights surrounding the park, but two of the four fields were vacant. The league that did reserve the fields chose not to use them that night.

Parents whose children played with Tracy Futbol Club were at a loss to explain why their team couldn’t practice at the Sports Complex when there were clearly fields that appeared to be available.

"My understanding was that the fields were doled out," said one TFC coach, who did not want to give her name. She added that with competition for fields in town, her teams have precious few nights when they could get a city permit to use the sports complex’s lighted fields.

"We have no options. There are no lights for us in town," she said. "We’re actually looking at going to Manteca because they have lighted fields for us to use."

It was an example of what can happen when a soccer team runs up against city policies that, in theory, are designed to make sure everyone is treated fairly.

Harry Bourassa, founder and president of Tracy Futbol Club, said his teams put in their requests to the city, but didn’t get permits to use fields for this month.

"This is probably the most important time to have practice fields as we get ready for the state cup," he said. "We have 20 teams that need fields now, and we can’t get them."

He added that his club’s teams wouldn’t use a vacant field without a permit because it could cause hard feelings between his league and the league that paid for the permit.

On Monday, all four fields were lit, but only two were used, one by a family who came out to kick a ball around, and another by a group of friends out for a football game. The latter group said they expected organized teams would get priority, but otherwise the fields would have gone unused.

City of Tracy Recreation Supervisor Floyd Lewis said that under those circumstances, the city still makes sure that only the teams that reserved the fields will use them, and added that the two groups that were there Monday were told to leave.

Lewis explained that under scheduling priorities established last year, Tracy Youth Soccer League applied for, and received, field reservations for Tracy Sports Complex for this month.

It costs a nonprofit group $5 per hour to rent the field and $7 per hour for the lights, and they pay those fees whether they use the field or not.

Lewis schedules fields for TYSL, TFC and Alternativo Futbol Club, and at least as many smaller clubs, but acknowledged that he can’t please everyone.

"We have a very limited amount of games we permit," he said, "and that impacts our ability to meet everyone’s needs. Nobody gets all of the dates they want, but we try to treat everyone fairly."

Darlene Wilharm of TYSL said that her group reserves fields in November and signs agreements with the city in January. That will give the league permits good between June 2009 and March 2010.

"You have to plan out your whole soccer year," she said. "In November-December, we’re planning for summer and next year," she said.

For the short term, TYSL, TFC and the city found a compromise.

"We did release some fields, because there were fields we were not using," Wilharm said.

But the conflict will likely re-emerge. This year, the city had to plan for two recreational leagues, including TYSL and a new youth league for Tracy Futbol Club, and TFC hopes to bring more tournaments in town in addition to its Orange Bowl in May.

"Until we get more fields built, we’ll probably be in this situation for the next few years. We just don’t have enough fields to accommodate everyone," Bourassa said, adding that the league has to plan around whatever schedule the city comes up with.

In the meantime, Lewis said, the Tracy Sports Complex and Plasencia Fields down the street will get as much use as they can tolerate, even if they go unused at times. Lewis described how constant use of a field inevitably damages the grass, which needs time to recover after any type of use.

"It’s always been this way, but in the past year, 2008, we reached a point where the fields were heavily impacted because of the use," Lewis said. "We just have too many organizations trying to book fields and not enough fields for everybody."