North Whidbey Little League volunteers have made tremendous improvements this season on several of the fields including new pitching mounds and replacing damaged dugouts, but the lack of a scoreboard at Volunteer Park’s number two field continues to be a hot topic.

Parents of softball players, along with coaches and other volunteers, reportedly have saved the league thousands of dollars by doing their own repair work at the field, including tearing down old dugout roofs and replacing them with new material.

In addition, girls softball has established a consistent staff of concession stand volunteer workers and profits from sales go back to the Little League.

Everything appears to be going as smoothly as an inning-ending double play except for the minor bobble of no scoreboard.

At a prior league meeting, the board turned down a plan to install a new scoreboard and the controversy was again brought up at the June 7 general meeting on the state of the league.

Ken Tyler, league president, attempted to defuse the situation which has several board members at odds, stating the problem is being worked on and a new scoreboard should be installed in time for next season.

However, this wasn’t good enough for coaching coordinator and board member Jan Sabalausky who said she thought the board is stalling on the issue and contends girls softball is not receiving an “equal share.”

“I think if one field doesn’t have a working scoreboard, then none of them at the other fields should be used,” she said.

When the cost of putting in a non-sponsored scoreboard was brought up, Sabalausky pointed out $1,000 was spent on a new baseball pitching mound and the board did not question the amount of money spent on that project.

Veteran umpire Rita Cline, also a board member, said a scoreboard is not always necessary and game strategy should not be dictated by the scoreboard. “There are times when umpires have ordered scoreboards be turned off during games,” she said.

When Sabalausky questioned why, Cline replied, “Because sometimes score-keepers can’t keep up. The umpire keeps track of the balls, strikes and outs, that’s all that matters.”

Cline further stated the reason the board voted down the scoreboard plan at the last meeting was because there was not enough information available at the time.

“This is a very expensive project, but the board is not against it,” she said.

Vice president for softball Ken Peckenpaugh suggested it was late in the season and board members should hold off further discussion of the issue until next year.

Tyler reiterated the project is being worked on and that a scoreboard should be installed at the field in time for the 2008 season.

“Hopefully, we will have the situation resolved by then,” he said.