All groups are facing a lack of sports facilities in the cities that is stifling the development of athletics. In Taipei people have started to play ball on the silt plains along the rivers and under the bridges.

Poor souls, forced to play in that wind, dust and noise! Designated as catchment districts in which building is prohibited, these riverside areas lack public facilities like lavatories and places to buy food and drink. If athletes want to eat or go to the bathroom, they'll have to fend for themselves.

Making things happen: What's the source of the problem? Why is it so difficult to find a place to play for a sport like softball, which only requires a field 80 meters square?

Lu Kuang-lieh, the social athletics director of the Physical Education Office in the Ministry of Education, says if there were more green expanses like the ones in the Taipei Youth Park and if the athletic fields of every elementary and junior high school were open to the general public, things would be a little better. It's just that the former involves the problem of land and the latter involves the problem of school management and control, and neither is easy to solve.

So does that mean you can simply forget about exercise? The ball rolls back to the river banks.

Many organizations speak of how they envy the Taipei Slow Pitch Softball Association (TSP) for having its own fields--the Huachiang Bridge fields.

This originally weed-choked, garbage-strewn riverside was adopted by TSP with the financial sponsorship of Mercury, Cathay, Shin Kong, Ve Wong and Fubon Land. From the planting of grass to the installing of simple viewing stands, the association puts the total cost at about NT$5 million.

Those who love softball have their own home field. We needn't get up at three or four on Sunday morning to "hold the fort," says TSP Secretary General Chen Chung-ho of the fight for diamonds at the Pailing Fields.

The new fields solved the problem of putting on 1,500 games a year, and everyone's enthusiasm for the sport soared.

Slow pitch teams composed of owners and employees of the fabric stores of Wanhua, an area neighboring the Huachiang bridge, multiplied. Today they independently form a seven-team "Fashion Cup" League, with regularly scheduled games.

Chiou Pao-lin, leader of the league's Tienlung team, points out that without the Huachiang fields, there would be no Tienlung team and no Fashion Cup. Every day this summer, he and his company's staff would get out of bed early, report to the field and play ball from 7︰00 to 9︰00 before changing and going to work.

Adopt a field, don't charge fees! Yet behind the convenience these new fields have brought are bills that stack up. The association says that they spend about NT$300,000 a month in field maintenance--leveling the red earth, cutting the grass and disposing of the garbage--all to provide people with safe, clean and comfortable ball grounds. Hence, as soon as the association opened the fields, it adopted a "user's fee" policy, requesting that those using the fields pay a maintenance charge of NT$1,000 for a half day and NT$2,000 for a full day.

"If there's an average of 20 people on a team, it averages out to less than NT$100 a person--it's cheap!" say those happy to pay the fee, but others are less willing. "The Huachiang Fields are on public land. What right does TSP have to charge fees?" Others wonder if there's any legal basis for using such a large space exclusively for softball. Can you use it for hardball or rugby?

The Taipei Office of City Parks and Street Lights, which originally gave the go-ahead for the fields to be adopted, is now shouting foul. The city government thought that "adopting a field" meant that an enterprise would handle and sponsor all management matters. "If it means charging fees, the government can do it itself!" is how people put it.

The association is in a tough position. From its standpoint, giving the huge population of slow-pitch softballers a place to play and maintaining it for them is in everyone's interest.

Secretary General Chen Chung-ho points out that regardless of the NT$1,000 or 2,000 standard, the fields are mostly used on Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. The association doesn't collect more than NT$60,000 a month in fees, far under actual maintenance costs, and the difference has to be made up by the association.

But many don't buy this. "If it was really such a money-losing proposition," says one figure in the world of athletics, "I don't believe businesses would continue sponsoring it." Everything is hard at the beginning, he maintains, but when the Huachiang fields get people's recognition, the TSP ought to be able to raise funds by renting billboards.

Businesses and sports groups--join--ing hands: Yet TSP has its own share of difficulties. Chen Chung-ho says that holding competitions and giving instruction to umpires and coaches require money. And as only one of 12 groups in the Taipei Athletic Association, TSP gets base funding of no more than NT$50,000-60,000 a year. It has to apply itself for additional funds to cover competitions.

"Now we're not worried that we're going to lose money," says Li Chin-hsien, the assistant secretary general of the association and the manager of the General Services Department at Ve Wong. "We're worried the government isn't going let us collect fees."

Providing management was precisely one of the TSP's original goals in getting corporations to adopt fields. And there's a mound of hidden problems in the background to this story. Previously, in the days before the sports craze, the various associations promoting athletics got most of their funding from the Ministry of Education. After paying for the cultivation of top caliber athletes and for personnel expenses and the like, associations usually only had enough to get by if they didn't set their sights too high. And this lack of funding explains why athletics has never been fully developed among the masses.

In recent years, because people have rising incomes, greater spending power and more time to spend on their health, sports have grown steadily more popular. As a result, even without government leadership, all of the associations have been walking the road toward mass participation.

The problem has come back again to funding. To sponsor a competition or do anything, the association's base of funding simply won't be enough, and so they're all scrambling to find support from business. Take TSP. With yearly expenses that often top NT$4 million, it counts Mercury, Ve Wong, Cathay, Hsin Kong and Les Enphants among its big corporate backers.

Service, not profit: Some believe that big business's entry on the scene will make the amateurishly sloppy and sluggishly managed athletics associations more vibrant and efficient. But more worry that the business atmosphere will pollute the purity of athletics.

Behind TSP's management of softball diamonds, these critics see drooling businessmen with dollar signs dancing in their eyes. Ve Wong's Li Chin-hsien says this image is unfair, distorting business's intention of giving something back to society.

Strictly speaking, while businesses may not be investing in athletics for profit per se, they hope that such actions--like anything else they do for the public interest--will work as good public relations, giving them a good image in society and getting them on the good side of government units and non-profit groups.

President of Satellite Television Marketing Daniel Tu, who was once involved with professional baseball management, adopts a different outlook. Take America, the foreign example with which he is most familiar. When you set aside professional sports and just look at amateur athletics, he avers, business provides abundant assistance. "For larger companies, it is tradition," he says. "It is assumed that they support cultural, athletic or charitable activities."

Chi Cheng, the secretary general of the R.O.C. Track and Field Association, says that in France--a country with which she is familiar--the rate of corporate sponsorship of athletics tops 40 percent.

Business has taken from society and thus should be used for society's benefit. But this doesn't mean any non-profit group can wring all it wants out of businesses. "Appropriate management is essential," says Chuang Yang-wen. "Otherwise a company's finance department will lose interest when it fears that the endeavor is a bottomless pit."

The Ministry of Education's Office of Physical Education is currently drafting a "Physical Education Law," which will clearly stipulate how all these associations can be run as if they were foundations. The law will permit associations to seek support from businesses and allow for appropriate management of competitions. But Daniel Tu holds that one has got to be extremely cautious about the business operations of leisure-oriented amateur athletics. "You've got to be service oriented and not for profit," he stresses.

How to find volunteers: As for the problem of fees for the Huachiang fields, Tu holds that as long as the charges remain within reason, the books are open, and the association continues to keep the fields safe and well kept, the user fees ought to be permitted.

"But everyone should have the common under-standing that this is a management measure of convenience that can't be helped because of the difficulty of finding fields in the cities," he says. Because it is public land, after an understanding is reached, the government ought to make a clear announcement to avoid disputes.

Of course, ideally the government should help to find and maintain green parks and athletic fields--only by so doing will it get to the root of the problem. Otherwise, it should adopt investment and tax policies to encourage people to invest in athletics. And it is here where many people in the field of athletics have hope: If everyone thinks of involvement in sports as a hobby and if those who have money and energy give them, then we can reduce the tremendous pile of bills.

Imagine if the Huachiang fields were on privately donated land, the earth was leveled by teams in turn, and each team cut the grass and removed the garbage after using a field. What would that be like?

[Picture Caption]

The vast expanse of 12 diamonds beneath the HuachiangBridge is the beloved paradise of slow-pitch softballers.

On the first day of league action, corporate cheerleaders came out to le nd their support and twirl their flags.

Can you imagine? This softball field was originally a fish pond next to the Anping Industrial Zone in Tainan City.

Look up from the red earth of the base paths, and you'll see that the highway is nearing completion. Besides the blue sky, white clouds and sun, the noise of traffic will soon accompany the balls and strikes.

On the first day of league action, corporate cheerleaders came out to le nd their support and twirl their flags.

Can you imagine? This softball field was originally a fish pond next to the Anping Industrial Zone in Tainan City.

Look up from the red earth of the base paths, and you'll see that the highway is nearing completion. Besides the blue sky, white clouds and sun, the noise of traffic will soon accompany the balls and strikes.