“We want to lead by example,” Spokane Indians give back with the Community Fields Project

SPOKANE, Wash. – “It was almost grass,” Spokane Indians senior vice president Otto Klein said. “It was unplayable.”

The Spokane Indians organization hammers away at refreshing and refurbishing a baseball field in Lincoln Park on the South Hill, one of many they’ve repaired over the last four years.

“New wood backstops, they didn’t have them before, and we’re putting in brand-new bases, brand-new pegs and distances, we’re going to just revitalize the whole area, and also clear out a bunch of the overgrown brush,” Klein said.

The Indians go out to fields like these at least twice a year to help give back within their Community Fields Project, expanding the sports’ reach even further.

“We’re the community’s baseball team,” Klein said. “So we want to lead by example, and our moral compass says, ‘give back to our community as much as we can,’ and we do it in a lot of different ways, but this field program, and our community fields program is a really rewarding one because it’s baseball.”

The Indians interns pitch in too, some coming back for more over the years.

“It’s fun actually getting our hands dirty and being in the community,” Spokane intern Campbell Thorner said. “That’s the great thing about being an intern here, it’s because we do so many community events like this.”

Les Schwab Tires partners with Spokane, and one branch manager says this work has extra meaning to him.

“I have children, and my children played in the spokane indians youth baseball, and seeing the condition of the fields when they play versus now,” Chris Zimmerman said. “We got this program going, seeing how they are after we get done, it’s pretty impressive. It’s really neat to support that and be a part of that.”

The whole process takes about four to five hours and will be open to youth ballplayers as soon as they wrap up.

“It’s all about the community: being with the tribe, being with the community members itself,” Thorner said. “We’re making an impact through every event and every game that we do, and it’s so special.”