Woodland Hills dance may provide green to replant soccer field

WOODLAND HILLS, Utah County — Residents hope a dance will provide the green to revamp its soccer field.

The tiny foothill city south of Spanish Fork has scheduled a Sweetheart Ball for Feb. 12 to raise money for the field.

"The response has been bigger than we expected for a first-year event," coordinator Shannon Erickson said.

Children from the soccer team went door-to-door and sold more than 30 tickets, Erickson said. Some residents didn't buy a ticket but gave them a donation for the field anyway. Tickets are $10 a couple.

"We're hoping it becomes a yearly tradition," she said.

Woodland Hills Avalanche Soccer Club and XAX deSigns are sponsoring the event.

Couples will dance to recorded big-band sounds and classic ballroom music in the community center behind the fire station, 676 S. Woodland Hills Road.

The soccer field is an improved meadow planted with perennial rye. Organizers hope to replace it with Kentucky bluegrass over fresh topsoil. The cost to replant the field "the right way" is about $200,000, Erickson said.

"We don't have that," she said, nor do they have the $10,000 to $15,000 to do a simpler fix.

But they plan on at least laying topsoil and reseeding it this spring.

Erickson described the existing grass as "poky." It catches the ball and interferes with play, she said.

— Rodger L. Hardy