Greg Wilson/Anderson Observer
It started when Brock Elder noticed a lot of kids playing pickup soccer on the old grassy areas at Wellington Mill Park.
The park, which for decades has been a hub for baseball, basketball, softball and soccer in the community, needed some work. Elder called Anderson County Administrator Rusty Burns and, working closely with Anderson Parks Manager Matt Schell, put together a plan to upgrade the park.
Elder had earlier been inspired by a program by Kyle Martino, who ran in the 2018 U.S. Soccer Federation presidential election and also works on air with NBC Sports in their coverage of the English Premier League, recently launched the non-profit Over Under Initiative with the goal of increasing access to sport in urban neighborhoods.
The organization refers to a solution for public playing surfaces which would provide soccer goals underneath basketball hoops. By converting basketball courts and other blacktops to multi-sport spaces, the Over Under Initiative is providing more play opportunities for kids most in need of these proven benefits.
Martino and his team tracked activity at thousands of public basketball courts across New York City, and found that hundreds of the courts were vacant every day for hours on end, effectively wasting opportunities for the community to use those surfaces for soccer or other sports.
“I was terrified to find out, simply the incredible life benefit of being involved in teams sports has become a luxury of a few and not a right of all,” Martino said on The SoccerWire Podcast. “I founded the Over Under Initiative because I knew access to youth sports was the big problem that’s becoming a health crisis with childhood obesity tripling since the ’70s… I was out to figure out, what is this problem keeping kids out of sports, and Over Under Initiative was the answer.”
Through the Initiative, Martino and his team have worked with cities not only in New York, but also in Grand Rapids, Mich. and now Anderson to provide multi-sport athletic courts in urban areas.
Martino is expected to visit Anderson for the grand opening, which is tentatively set for mid-November if delays in shipping of equipment can be overcome.
Elder talked about the project, his involvemnt in soccer, and more in this interview with the Anderson Observer.